Charms Can't Fix Us: Practical Magical Applications
by Cordelia McGonagall
Summary: A companion piece to the story "Charms Can't Fix Us." Parvati has the "eighth years" plan a spring camping trip for the older students to teach practical magic they learned during the War. Hermione and Draco test their new relationship as they prepare to leave the security of Hogwarts forever. Neville, as usual, is adorable. As always, full credit to J.K.R.
1. Parvati Has a Plan

It was an unseasonably warm day in early March. What little snow they'd had that winter had melted in the sun of a cloudless day, and the air smelled of wet, thawing earth.

Hermione and Parvati picked their way down to the greenhouses, and Parvati stopped to let the pale, spring sun warm her face. As returning students after the War, young women who had suffered and lost so much, they took time to absorb simple pleasures when they revealed themselves. Their pace to class was a reflection of their pace this year: they gave themselves time. And in this time of the last six months, the two had poured their energies into healing. For Parvati, that had meant saying goodbye to Lavender Brown, her best friend. For Hermione, it had meant forgiving Draco Malfoy, a journey which she started with hesitation, but had made willingly when his contrition never wavered. And once that journey had ended, she discovered the prejudice and enmity had camouflaged another path farther on. She would have once cringed; she would have barked a laugh over the incredible notion of Draco Malfoy loving her, and she loving him back. But a Muggle-born girl was used to the fantastical becoming over time a truth to count on, and Hermione was able again to let herself follow her heart to what she knew was right.

Hermione stood in the sunshine and put her face up to the sky as Parvati had done, letting the warmth glow red in front of her closed eyes. The nightmares had faded over time, but Hermione had stayed awake last night until the early hours of the morning with an anxious second-year Gryffindor, an orphan of the War, and the fatigue brewed a headache that the warmth was soothing.

Without opening her eyes, Parvati spoke, picking up an old thread Hermione had hoped she'd forgotten. "I talked to Professor McGonagall, and she thinks it's an interesting idea. We just need to write up a proposal and delegate tasks."

"We?" Hermione felt her headache creeping back to grip her temples.

"You said you would help write lessons," Parvati reminded her.

Hermione sighed. "I did, didn't I?"

Months ago, the young women had discussed the lack of practical, household spells in their formal education, a gap they had discovered when Parvati retreated to the Room of Requirement to hide from the Carrows and Hermione had fled with Harry on the quest for Horcruxes. Parvati had suggested they combine the learning of practical charms with an outing for the older students and take the sixth and seventh-year students camping. Hermione had been instantly repulsed by the idea; she hadn't healed enough from the grueling months of hunger, cold, and fear. The smells of a damp fire, a mildewed tent, and burnt tinned food had lingered in her memory as it was, and she was quietly afraid that recreating them would trigger the nightmares that had fractured her sleep in the aftermath of the War. And today, she felt that fatigue acutely in the gnawing pain that was settling as a tightening band around her skull.

Hermione's voice tightened. "Does anyone else think this is a good idea?'

Parvati picked up Hermione's tone, but her confidence wasn't touched by it. "Seamus thinks it is an excellent idea."

Hermione pursed her lips and put her head down, accepting her headache until she could get back to the castle. They began to walk.

Hermione muttered, "Seamus would think training baby dragons was a good idea if you were the one to suggest it, Parvati."

Parvati grinned. "I know. But that doesn't make my idea bad."

"What does everyone else say? You need to have everyone on board if we are to teach and supervise that lot. It's getting warmer, and some of them are starting to recover from last year. Little Maeve even got a detention for passing notes in Charms. Some of them are positively wild, not being able to put a toe out of line for so long." Hermione started grasping for arguments to stall.

Parvati sniffed. "You sound so old, Granger. We can drop you at St. Polycarp's Home for the Aged on our way. After you write the lessons. But you need to promise me to let me do my pitch without heckling it. Let them decide what to think for themselves."

"Fine." Hermione grinned at her friend in spite of her apprehension.

The returning "eighth years" chose an independent course of study for the year based on the classes and lessons they had missed from their fragmented schooling. Parvati knew that they would all be in Herbology today, and tending to pots would be a perfect opportunity to pitch her plan.

The younger students were already set to their tasks, and Hermione and Parvati were the last to join their peers. Seamus, Dean, and Anthony were covered in soil, struggling to repot a small tree that appeared to be fighting the process. Susan and Hannah were thinning herb seedlings and marking some notes on a small clipboard. Draco was in front of a table of bare roots, his hands clasped behind his back, carefully listening to Neville explaining the ways to discern the differences between them. Hermione had been lulled into the normalcy of Draco as her boyfriend and the friend of her fellow Gryffindors, but she still found herself appreciating these moments of harmony that would have been absurd years ago. She stopped to watch the two, a small smile on her lips. Draco and Neville had been spending more time together of late studying the medicinal uses of the flora in the greenhouses, as Draco had been accepted into the Healer school in London in the fall, and Neville had formally accepted the offer to teach Herbology next year at Hogwarts. She sidled up between the two, and Draco slid an arm around her waist without taking his eyes off Neville, who was using his wand to point to the root hairs of each of the specimens. Hermione waited for him to finish.

"Hi, Neville. What is our task for today?"

"Thought you'd want to identify those mushrooms over there to test yourselves. Then if you could thin the seedlings, that would be useful. It's good to know how, if you keep a home potions garden."

"That is a _practical_ application we wouldn't have learned last year," Parvati said, eyeing her friend who rolled her eyes and walked over to the wooden boxes of mushrooms.

The tree finally allowed itself to be transplanted and the group settled around a long table, thinning the rest of the seedings for the gardens outside. Parvati gave Hermione a teasing, warning look and began her pitch.

"Last term, Hermione and I were talking about our lack of practice in practical spells, the household spells, that we needed to feed and take care of ourselves when we were on the run. I thought it would be a good experience to put some lessons together and take a group of sixth and seventh years on a camping weekend to teach the spells as we learned them. It would be a fun getaway for them, too. I spoke to Professor McGonagall, and she thinks the plan has merit. She will consider a proposal if you think it is a good idea."

Dean raised his eyebrows and looked over at Hermione. "You want to go camping? I thought you said you never wanted to put a toe in a tent again."

Hermione looked over at Parvati and bit her lip. "Well, I did say that once, yes. Parvati would, uh, like you to decide if you think it's a good idea." Parvati nodded approval at her friend and smiled at the group.

Draco's eyes narrowed as he looked back and forth between Parvati and his girlfriend. "Parvati, are we really trying to prepare the graduates of Hogwarts for homelessness?"

Seamus saw Parvati's chin jut out and he cut in, "Camping is hardly like being homeless, mate."

"Felt like it last year," Dean mumbled.

Parvati put down the handful of pulled seedlings and looked at Dean sympathetically. Hermione had been a target of every Death Eater in Britain, but Dean was truly on his own until he'd met up with other refugees.

The others had been quietly picking through the seedlings with their heads down. Neville stopped and looked up.

"Well, I understand why Dean and Hermione would have a hard time with this. And if they didn't want to go, I would think that was a very reasonable choice. We were hiding in this castle, but we still had a fireplace and a roof over our heads. We didn't have to run. There may be students who disappeared last year too who don't want to go, and their parents wouldn't have to give permission. But Seamus and I burned baskets of food before we got it right. We ruined our clothes trying to keep them clean. I would go, Parvati. I could teach the students to identify potion ingredients and edible plants."

Dean smiled softly at Neville, and Hermione gave a shuddery sigh. _He's always so good at making people feel heard_, Hermione thought. She looked over at Hannah, who was beaming at her fiancé.

Hannah nodded. "I'll go."

Seamus grinned at Parvati, and Anthony nodded and murmured, "I'm in. Bet Justin would go, too. Knows Muggle stuff, for situations where magic can't help."

Draco blinked. "When can magic not help?" He looked over at Seamus who was scowling at him. "Oh, come on, Finnegan. I'm not arguing with Parvati. We all know Anthony's pulling for a reason to go camping with his boyfriend. I get it, don't you, Seamus?"

Seamus grinned. "I'm pretty sure we'd have to split up and bunk with the younger students, seeing as how we'd be chaperones."

"You aren't selling this, mate," Dean recovered his good humor and winked at Susan who blushed.

"You boys are ridiculous," Susan drawled. "I'm in. I think it is a good idea. If they have to earn the trip, maybe I won't have to deal with so many Hufflepuffs skipping tutoring sessions for detention."

Hermione felt a swoop of guilt remembering how brokenhearted she was when her friends dismissed S.P.E.W. It was a good idea, and perhaps she shouldn't hide from the ghosts of last year. She took a deep breath.

"I'll go. I don't want Dean to feel like he has to, though. He had it the worst. But I will go." She was surprised to look up and see Draco's jaw tense.

"I don't know how many Slytherins I can get to go," he muttered.

"Because they don't want to be around the Gryffindors?" Seamus challenged.

Draco rolled his eyes and clicked his tongue with a _tsk_. "Because a fair lot of them were laying low in the library or hiding at home pretending to be at Durmstrang all last year. I have fifteen from my house whose families hid their blood status - they were afraid of getting snatched at any turn. Merlin, some of them could barely look at me last September. They get jumpy about even walking out to the Quidditch pitch. You remember that betting pool I ran last fall. It was the only social activity I could think of that kept them busy in the dungeons. It was just a bonus that I didn't have to polish my shoes until January.

Parvati cocked her head. "Does that mean you won't go?'

Draco huffed. "Of course I will go. I'm the only Slytherin here, aren't I? I don't suppose I have a choice. Some of these prats barely listen to me, much less a Hufflepuff...sorry, Susan, Hannah."

Susan rolled her eyes and Hannah chuckled.

Dean pulled off his leather gloves and sighed. "I'm in. I learned loads to make me self-sufficient last year. I suppose one way to make something out of that is to teach it to someone."

"Well, that is everyone, then!" Parvati beamed. Hermione and I will sit down - maybe you'd be kind enough to join us, Dean and Neville, and write a plan of what we want them to learn, and then Hermione will help me write lessons. I suppose, Nev, you'll need to help us with the Herbology ones. Then we can divide up the work and present it to McGonagall. She's going to have to approve it and get permission forms to the parents."

Dean nodded. "We are doing this over a pint."

Seamus grinned at his friend. "Thanks, mate. How about Broomsticks tomorrow, yeah?"

The plans having been made, the friends wiped down the long, worn potting bench and headed out to the castle for dinner.

Hermione was so overwhelmed by what she'd just agreed to that she didn't notice Draco's steely look until he snagged her to hold her back from the group making their way up the steep path.

"Why did you say yes?" he growled.

Hermione blinked at him in surprise. "Because I felt bad. When I made S.P.E.W., Ron and Harry thought I was mad. But it was a good idea, and it was important to me that they support it. That they support _me_. Why are you upset?"

Draco chewed on the inside of his cheek before he blurted, "I don't want you to do something that is going to bring those nightmares back. I love you too much to watch you suffer anymore. Remember how awful they were?" Draco's voice was insistent and pleading.

Hermione looked at him with a flinty look. "I do, Draco." She saw him pull back at her face and her tone, and she softened. "I do. I...it must have been hard for you to watch me suffer, especially since..."

"Some of them were set in my drawing room?"

"Yes." Hermione tried to forget, and realized that neither she nor Draco ever would.

"We can't obliviate ourselves...I suppose it is better for our new world that we remember, but I don't want to go back there. I don't want to do one damn thing to take you back there. It was hard enough to watch you walk through the doors of the Manor again. Thank Merlin we have new memories there."

Hermione wrapped her arms around Draco's waist and settled her head on his chest. "Well, that is a good way to think of it, then. Maybe we can make new memories for me. And Dean. Maybe we could try to have fun with it."

Draco kissed the top of her head and rested his chin there. "If you say so, love."


	2. Draco Looks Back

Hermione sunk lower into the bubbles and closed her eyes. Still almost a year after their capture by the Snatchers, Hermione's muscles still would ache from the torture; it happened rarely and sporadically, and she could never discern a pattern. Yoga and meditation helped, and so did a warm bath, a simple luxury she would never again take for granted. The lightly perfumed bubbles drew out the sharp twinges in her ribs, and Hermione sighed happily. She stayed in, charming the water to stay warm, until her skin started to pucker, and she dried quickly to avoid a chill.

Tonight was a date with Draco. As they recovered and found their places in this world after the War, they began to see a future take shape, and though their studies became more intense, they committed to carving out time for just each other. They were meeting their friends to plan the camping trip, but Draco squeezed in early reservations in London for dinner. She padded into her room and stretched out naked on her bed, closing her eyes. She wasn't worried about being disturbed. Draco knew the password to her room, but he always knocked. Once, Ron, who'd come with Harry for a visit, asked Draco why he didn't use it as they waited outside her locked door, and Draco had scorched him with a withering look, saying that he wasn't going to take any relationship advice from someone who managed to devolve into being "just friends" with Hermione Granger.

She and Draco were friends, excellent ones, and though neither of them felt old-fashioned when it came to sex or gendered roles, Draco had promised he would woo Hermione after offering her years of pointed, scornful attacks, and she loved his insistence on a respectful formality to their courtship, even as they became more intimate. She didn't feel he owed it to her, but it made them both happy; there was something so lovely about the flirting and ritual after the very different intimacy with Ron and Harry, which was based as much on survival as it was friendship. Parvati had confided that Seamus had been paying attention; he started sending her love notes after he'd seen Hermione at breakfast last month flush with pleasure after reading a parchment sealed with a wax _M_ and wander off, leaving her half-eaten toast behind.

And Hermione appreciated all of it, and took great care this evening selecting her outfit to see a boy she'd been studying with just two hours before. She slipped on a grey sweater dress that hugged her in the best places and wiggled into Parvati's cowboy boots. She grabbed her wrap and her purse and pulled the door open at Draco's knock.

They'd found a cozy French wizarding restaurant they both liked near St. Mungo's and it had become their place; they only dined there alone. It was over _oeufs en meurette _that they had celebrated Draco's acceptance to Healer training, and they had spent three hours there once, after a flurry of owls from various Ministry offices, discussing which department was best suited to Hermione. Draco had asked for a quill and ink and had taken notes on the white butcher paper laid over the tablecloth. Hermione still had it; he'd observed things she hadn't realized she'd been thinking. He divided the paper into "Departments Which Will Be Lucky to Have You," and "Departments You Are Far Too Good For." Draco had said once that even when her presence in the library made him nervous and angry, once upon a time, he had always known her skill; he'd mocked her status in the dying hierarchy of blood, but he'd always keenly felt her genius. Once, that prejudice and fear had fueled her, but Hermione readily admitted that it was even more motivating to have Draco Malfoy in her corner, encouraging her at every turn. Her lips felt better on his cheek than her hand had.

Tonight,_ La Bonne Sorcière_ was humming with chatter and warmth, and Aurore, the owner and pastry chef, swooped in to hug two of her favorite guests who had become friends. "_'Allo! 'Allo! Salut! Ça va?" _She'd set an intimate table, and soon the couple was sipping wine and chatting, leaning into "their" table and holding hands. A wizard facing the pair was staring at their laced fingers, Draco's thumb softly rubbing Hermione's. Hermione felt his eyes on them and looked up to see a middle-aged wizard scowl and turn his head to his tablemates, who lacked any interest in subtlety in their staring. Draco had spent months with the Healer assigned to Hogwarts, learning how to make amends, and he usually took the rudeness as an unwritten part of his sentence. While Hermione could not expect others to forgive because she had, she didn't find rudeness deserved. She looked over at the table and made unpleasantly cool eye contact with each diner until they slowly turned back to their meals. Draco looked awkwardly at the ceiling. They both knew better than to speak of it.

Draco cleared his throat and pulled Hermione's attention back to him with a look so smoldering that Hermione squirmed and blushed. He grinned cheekily at his girlfriend and stabbed a forkful of salad.

"Are you going back to the second interview for the House Elf Legal Liaison position?"

"Mmm..." Hermione finished chewing and shook her head slowly. "I used to think I'd go to H.E.L.L., but I am worried it's a dead office, like you'd said. I have an interview with International Magical Cooperation, Kiki Nguyen in Sydney is a good reference, and I suppose I'll hear what the Muggle Liaison Office wants to say." Hermione took a sip of water. "Have you been looking for flats in _The Prophet_?"

"Yes. Two I'll look at next week. You?"

"That one I showed you. Harry did offer me a room at Grimmauld Place," - at this Draco carefully arranged his face to neutral - "but I told him no. I don't have to give the press more to hound him about." At this, Draco allowed himself a relieved, small smile. "I'm thinking he wants to ask Ginny to move in with him, but he's scared she will say no. Or yes."

Draco looked at her thoughtfully. "Does it bother you I haven't asked you to move in with me?"

Hermione smiled. "No. I need to take care of myself for a little bit. I don't plan on you losing track of me." Draco smiled at her, wolfishly. She bit her lip and smiled shyly. "I was thinking Parvati might want to move in with me this next year. She's signed on to a Muggle counseling training program. Says mental health aligns with her strengths in Divination."

Draco snorted, but nodded. "Ah, she'll be wonderful at it. Carna thinks St. Mungo's will want her. She'd be a good roommate for you, too."

They polished off their meals. Both Hermione and Draco loved these dinners; Hermione still appreciated the warmth and beauty of plentiful food not charred over a campfire, and Draco had, this time last year, lost his will to eat at all, forcing himself to swallow anything to keep his mother from yet another gnawing worry. He was happy to have his appetite back, too.

Aurore came by to put a hand on each of their shoulders and discuss dessert. "We 'ave _une tarte à la mèlasse_. Good!"

Draco shivered. He had to rush to explain himself. "Oh, I'm sorry. I am sure your treacle tart is the best, but I, um, was ill once after... Do you have your _tarte au citron_?"

"For you, _oui!" _

Hermione held up two fingers to indicate she'd have the same and asked for coffees as well. After Aurore left, she made a quizzical face. "Hate treacle tart that much, huh?"

Draco sat quietly. "That, ahh, was Voldemort's favorite pudding."

Hermione thought of Harry bolting down his third helping at Christmas and coughed. A bubble of absurd laughter rose in her throat.

"Voldemort had a favorite pudding?"

Draco looked grim but his mouth flickered at the corners when he saw Hermione giggle. "Yes," he said, seriously, but his eyes were starting to twinkle at his amused girlfriend whose giggle became uncontrolled as she shook with laughter. He pulled a face and held up his hand and ticked off a list with his finger. "His favorite animal was the unicorn, his favorite team was the Tutshill Tornados, his favorite color was Slytherin green, and his favorite sweet was treacle tart...Why do I think this is so goddamn funny?" he asked, as he and Hermione's breath came in gasps from laughing.

"I...uh...suppose because it isn't funny at all."

"It isn't, is it?" he muttered, as he wiped his eyes with his napkin, noting the scowl from the man at the table opposite them.

Their desserts finished and their bill settled, they apparated to Hogsmeade and to the flower shop which was Draco's regular first stop before visiting The Three Broomsticks. He chose a thick bunch of poppies for remembrance, and as they left, he pulled Hermione into a kiss that rapidly turned to a snog. When they broke apart, breathing heavily, Hermione smiled dazedly and gasped, "What was that for?"

Draco grinned and raised his wand. In a voice still husky from the kiss, he called out, "_Expecto Patronum!"_ An otter shot out of his wand and sped gracefully toward the pub.

Hermione beamed at it. "I will never grow tired of seeing your Patronus."

Draco smiled at her and nodded. "Had to send Madam Rosmerta an owl telling her it'd changed." Carna, the St, Mungo's Healer, had months ago arranged a meeting between the pub owner and the boy who'd cursed her and was now asking for nothing but the chance to express his remorse. He promised her flowers, which she said weren't necessary, but the Patronus was essential to prepare the nerves of a witch who had suffered for her kindness. Draco pocketed his wand and held out his free hand to Hermione, his Patronus' muse, to hold.

The Three Broomsticks was crowded with Hogwarts students, and the couple shuffled their way to the bar where Madam Rosemerta was polishing pint glasses. She accepted the flowers with a thin smile and a wordless nod, turning away to place the glasses on the shelves behind her. A wizard with a handlebar mustache poured them each a drink.

Their friends were gathering at a large table in the back of the pub. Anthony and Justin were sitting at the far end of the rectangular table chatting with Dean and Susan. Hannah and Neville were sharing the center of the table with Parvati and Seamus. Draco and Hermione slid into the chairs at the near end.

The friends greeted her warmly and Hermione, as she had so often done these past few months, felt tears prick her eyes at the beautiful normalcy of these good people who were no longer fellow soldiers or victims, but simply friends. This thought occurred to her as she hugged Neville, and she could feel in his squeeze back that he completely understood.

Anthony called out to her. "Hey, Hermione. I'm glad you're here. Hold Thomas' hand before he gets too pissed."

Dean pulled a face and pointedly put his glass down. "Oh, shut it, Goldstein. I'd rather not wipe the ground with you in front of Justin." He winked at Anthony's boyfriend, and Anthony roared with laughter as Justin rolled his eyes and snorted.

"I see we've missed the preliminary proceedings of the meeting," muttered Draco to Seamus, who was grinning with his eyes closed as he pinched the bridge of his nose.

"We are excellent role models, aren't we, Nev?" Hannah said after she swallowed the dregs of her firewhiskey and leaned into her fiancé, who smiled and smothered a laugh in his pint.

"Okay, you layabouts," Parvati called out, businesslike, "Now that Granger and Malfoy have decided to stop canoodling and grace us with their presence, let's begin." Parvati pulled out parchment and a quill. Hermione leaned in to give Parvati her attention; she remembered how nervous she was at her first D.A. meeting. Even though they were now among friends, Hermione knew this meant a lot to Parvati. Draco looked at his girlfriend with a careful, sideways glance and saw her forced smile of interest. He leaned on an elbow to listen to Parvati. With his other hand, he gently rubbed Hermione's lower back and then kept his hand there, unnoticed to anyone but her.

In some ways, Hermione and Dean were better insulated for what came next, for they feared it the most. As the group began to make a list of practical spells and magical skills they'd needed in the last year, skills they'd not learned in school, each blurted, mumbled, or sighed a story with no desire to top the last.

"...wandless magic to sever the chain. I've never wanted something so much..."

"...I cut him trying to untie him. My hands were shaking so badly..."

"...wards. I still ward my room at night. I can't stop..."

"...it felt so inhuman to be that filthy. So I jumped in the lake, and then I couldn't get warm..."

"...Michael started bleeding from his mouth. I couldn't find Madame Pomfrey. I was afraid to try..."

Draco's quiet, steely voice cut over their jumbled ones. "Harry saved you all with the D.A. Each one of you beat death with those spells. The hard ones, the flashy ones, the ones Umbridge was afraid you would learn. But the devil was in the details, wasn't it? We couldn't have known what we would need to do and what we wouldn't be able to sort in the moment. Even I...stuck in the Manor, safer than you all, couldn't save Professor Burbage. I couldn't save Hermione. The only thing I could do well was charm a bloody cabinet and _Silencio _my bloody door. My house elf..." he looked at Hermione, who was pale and shaking her head, "unscrewed the fucking chandelier. How easy is that? How do I teach children to fucking _think _when I couldn't?

No one spoke or looked at Draco. Hermione looked furious. Draco started blinking rapidly, startled by himself.

"Shite, Parvati. I'm sorry. I was worried about Hermione. I didn't think... This...this is a good idea. Your idea is good. We can do this. We, ah, should do this. We aren't fighting anymore. We aren't fighting." Draco shielded his eyes with his hand. He flinched when Seamus put his hand on his shoulder and held it there, crooning as if to a child in the night, "S'over, mate. All over. You are done. Let's let it go, now." Hermione looked over at Neville, who looked very far away. Hannah had put her arm around Dean, who was ashen.

Parvati's eyes were glassy. She whispered, "I'm so sorry, everyone. We aren't ready for this. We don't have to be."

Susan's eyes were shining, but her voice was steady. "No. Seamus is right. We aren't at war anymore. Some household spells would help them all. It is a good idea. I can do this, because I am with you." She reached across the table and grabbed Dean's hand.

Parvati looked at the group and nodded slightly. The rest quietly drank. As they recovered themselves, they quietly added to their list, picking themselves up from their fall.

"Hermione's blue jar flame..."

"stasis charms for food..."

"a wandless _Accio_..."

"clothes cleaning charms..."

"healing potions..."

"packing spells..."

"bug-repelling charms for food _and_ people..."

The suggestions slowed and Anthony summoned the list to his hands. Justin leaned in to read over his shoulder.

Justin murmured, "Quite a list. How long d'you think McGonagall will let us take them for?"

Parvati nodded. "Friday afternoon until Sunday evening."

Hannah reached over and pulled the parchment to her. I suppose we should figure out how to place this learning in a practical situation. Then make a schedule. Then divide the lessons amongst us."

They pointed out spells that worked together, Parvati nodding and listening, scribbling what she heard.

Dean took a deep breath and spoke. "I am going to choose, right now, to have fun with this. When we are meditating, Carna always reminds me of the power I have. I don't want to carry that stunted, dead lizard in my head anymore. Let's have fun together before we have to go. Thank you for challenging us to make something positive here, Parvati."

Draco looked at Hermione, and she could see he was unnerved with her challenging look. Parvati didn't see the exchange. She just looked at Dean and smiled.

They left the pub with bits of parchment with their assignments. They left as a group, but soon they paced themselves to have private time with their partners to undoubtedly discuss what had been an emotional evening.

Hermione rounded on Draco. He stepped back when he saw that she was shaking, her fists clenched in anger.

Her voice was shaky, too. He hadn't seen her this furious with him since she'd slapped him all those years ago. "Draco, we need to get something straight. I forgave you. For all of it. I didn't forget. I know you never will, either. But we cannot be happy if you Time-Turner me back to Bellatrix every time you have guilt over what you did, or didn't do. You cannot be with me if you feel you owe me a debt forever. When I forgave you, did you believe me?"

"Yes," Draco breathed, shocked.

"Good," she spat. "Because I believed you when you said you were sorry. I know you are. But like you said months ago, I've had enough sad for a lifetime. We will have more sad. Everyone does. Life is sad. So let's not carry around what we have agreed to let go. We had a deal, Draco. And this project of Parvati's is something I have decided to do. I'm in. But it's going to be hard, and I need you. You suffered in ways I don't know and I can only imagine - I know that day I was tortured, we both were overcome. But Draco, you can't be so worried about not saving me _then_ that you don't save me _now_. And you are, you know. You are saving me...every...single...day."

"I'm...sor..." Draco quickly corrected himself. "You are right. I'm going to meet up with Carna, if she is free. Any bloke would feel lucky to have you. I suppose I have more to get through than most. Thank you for...this." He bit his lip and held out his hand to her, the unasked question hanging in the air. She answered it, leaning up to press a kiss on his cheek, and let him walk her silently back to the castle.


	3. Hermione Does Some Research

Hermione woke up on Sunday morning in Draco's bed at Hogwarts. There was a delicate understanding between the of-age students who returned to give their time to the school and the teachers who had fought alongside them, for if the professors had any reasons to suspect they were discreetly sharing their rooms, they had kept them quiet as well. And Draco and Hermione were hardly living together; she kept her space and he his, but after last night, after they had been rattled by their pasts, they needed this to be sure of each other. The talks with Carna had helped them each to master their demons plaguing them, but nothing had seemed to work as well as sharing sleep had.

Draco's arm was wrapped snugly around her, and his comforting scent lulled her back into a doze. She woke again later and flipped to look at him, his face vulnerable and blank in sleep. He curled up, reacting to her absence, and Hermione tucked a blanket around him and slipped into his bathroom for a shower. She stepped back into the room to see Draco still asleep. After last night, she didn't want him to wake alone, so she tucked herself into a chair and began to write the lessons she would teach on the camping trip.

Not everyone had access to a magical bag like the one she'd taken with her to search for Horcruxes, so Hermione began by breaking down the process of packing magically into a series of shrinking, waterproofing, and enlarging spells. Once she was done with this, she began on the complicated series of warding charms, when she looked up from her parchment and saw a pair of half-lidded grey eyes studying her.

"Hi," she said, softly.

Draco stretched and smiled. "'_Hi_,' she says. '_Hi_.' Keeps me up half the night, not even sure I can walk properly today, and it's just '_Hi_,' as casual as you please. Come a little closer and say that."

Hermione smirked and tossed her writing on the floor. She climbed onto his bed and straddled Draco, grinning down at him.

"Hi, Draco."

"Hi, yourself, beautiful. You've entirely too many clothes. Are the silencing charms still on?"

"Mmm hmm," Hermione grinned as she slid her hands over her boyfriend's shoulders.

"Excellent. Let's test them," Draco smirked and took her face in his hands as he sat up to kiss her.

* * *

The morning had disappeared, and Hermione was considering her second attempt at getting on with their day.

"We missed eating breakfast," Hermione realized.

"I'm certain we both had something." Draco mused, putting his hands behind his head.

Hermione mirrored his blank expression for a moment and then made a disgusted face. "You are dreadful. Get cleaned up, you sluggard. I'm not skipping my Sunday dinner." She stood and wandered the perimeter of his bed, gathering her clothes.

Draco followed her movements hungrily and then sighed. "If we must." He shuffled off to his bathroom for a quick shower.

They decided to settle themselves in the library to finish the drafts of their lessons. After the tension from yesterday, they both wanted to commit to their decisions without lingering over them. Two hours later, Hermione had wards, packing, and bluebell flame lessons carefully staged, step-by-step. Draco had written a series of basic wizarding and Muggle first-aid measures; he'd watched his father flounder under Voldemort without use of his own wand for long enough to realize that a wizard needed the ability to help himself without ready magic.

They reviewed each other's work and made minor revisions and then made duplicates of their parchments for their friends' perusal. Hermione wanted to clear her head with a walk down by the lake, for although she and Draco had hours of work and revision continually looming, she could not resist the gentle spring day calling to her.

Walking hand-in-hand with Draco by the lake was bliss for Hermione. She'd missed out on this, one of many simple pleasures, and she now wanted to take full advantage of having a boyfriend at Hogwarts. Draco appeared to feel the same; as he steered them the long way around the grounds, he gave her hand an occasional squeeze for her to return.

She led him to a flat rock by the water's edge to sit, and he slid his sunglasses on and lay down to sun himself, resting his head on one arm and her head in the crook of the other.

"Draco, I love this."

"Mmm hmm," he agreed.

"I think I am ready to move on, though," she mused.

Draco jerked up so suddenly, he almost dumped her head on the rock.

"What?"

"Oh!" Hermione gasped, out of surprise and realization. "That sounded wrong. I didn't mean move on from you! Honestly, after last night? This morning? Silly." She leaned forward and kissed him playfully. "I meant move on from Hogwarts. From Carna. From making my recovery a part-time job. From being so afraid of making more bad memories that I don't make good ones. Going to the Manor was one of the best, scariest decisions I've made all year, did you know?"

Draco sat up and put his arm around her without a word.

Hermione sat in silence for a moment before continuing, "I...I admit I do fear...well, Harry left, and we will always be close, but not as close as...and Ron...well, that will never be the same, although..." Hermione leaned into Draco to soften him, as he had sat up stiffly at her wistful mention of Ron's name. "It all turned out the way it needed to for me. For once. I guess I am just wanting to test how better I am. Dean's right. Right now, we can choose happy. I choose you. But I suppose I'm a little insecure about what happens when we both leave."

Draco scowled. "You are worried I'll leave you when we leave here?"

Hermione winced. "That is so needy. Not at all attractive. I'm so tired of being left and shut out by people I love."

Draco examined her face with a calm seriousness. "I'm the one who should be worried, and I think we both know that." He smirked and nodded at her little smile. "If we get to planning for forever, it will be forever. But until then, I'm not leaving you. I'm not going to fade away. I'm not going to shock you with an ugly surprise. If you find yourself sitting alone in Hyde Park, it will be because you left me. And please, don't do that, because you made four distinct fantasies of mine come to fruition last night, but there is still a rather extensive list left for you."

Hermione pulled back to look at Draco skeptically. "Only four?"

Draco snorted. "You really are an overachiever. A billion points to Gryffindor, Miss Granger. If you are nice, I will allow you to tackle number seventeen this evening."

Hermione giggled. "We should compare lists. You already took care of my number seventeen two weeks ago."

Draco chuckled and hugged her, and they stood to walk on as the sun began to fade behind the tips of the pines.

Hermione said a reluctant goodbye to Draco and returned to her room for a while. The door to her shared bath and Parvati's room were open, and Parvati and Susan called her into Parvati's room.

"Granger, where in the hell have you been? Oh, wait. I know," Parvati shook her head and waved her hand dismissively as Susan looked on, laughing.

Hermione took the ribbing and smiled a hello at Susan. "Here, _Patil_," she said as she thrust her and Draco's work into Parvati's hands.

Parvati sat on her bed and patted a spot for Hermione to sit as she read. "Well, these are...brilliant." She hugged Hermione. "Thanks, Hermione. Everyone must have felt as you did - I've gotten something from everyone. Neville already had things written for next year; he was first. Oooh," Parvati interrupted herself, "...and Susan Skeeter here has some gossip about herself for once."

"Parvati!" Susan gasped, "I'm not that bad!"

"You are, a bit," Hermione nodded.

"Just because I pay attention and am not oblivious like you, Hermione, doesn't mean..." Susan sputtered.

Parvati cut over them both. "Oh, for Merlin's sake! Spill it!"

Susan shrugged her shoulders to her ears and grinned widely. "Dean asked me if I was seeing anyone else. And I said no. And he asked me if I would keep it that way. Eeeeeeee." She bit her lip and waited for Hermione's reaction.

"Oh, gosh! That is...How is it?" Hermione looked back and forth between the two to gauge how she should react. Susan looked surprised.

Parvati goggled at Hermione. "Dear gods." Parvati turned to Susan and looked at her sympathetically. "Susan, sweetheart, Hermione is new to having friends." She turned back to Hermione with an incredulous look. "Obviously, Granger, the correct answer here is _that is fantastic_."

Susan grinned agreeably. "I know what you mean, Hermione. Dean and I would never have dated at Hogwarts, you know, before. The War changed us both. We have some really awful things in common that helped us find the good ones."

Parvati ignored Susan and shook her head at Hermione. "You are really something, you know that, Granger? Bloody _'that's um.' _Supportive, you are. You are halfway to being Mrs. Draco Malfoy and you think Bones and Thomas are an odd couple? Good thing I know we have a Healer here, because you are mental."

Susan had collapsed in the soft chair next to the bed and was laughing.

Hermione looked wrong-footed and embarrassed, but she saw Parvati smirk with a wicked gleam in her eye, and Hermione ignored the teasing to consider Parvati's words, getting lost in them, Draco's words also still playing in her mind.

"I'd probably just keep my name."

Parvati froze. Susan gasped, and together the two women began to laugh hysterically, gasping for breath.

"Oh, Hermione," choked Parvati through another wave of giggles, "I love you."

Hermione nodded, the absurdity of it all settling on her. "I guess we have all come so far that I forgot where we started, didn't I? Come a long way, I suppose."

"Mmm hmm," Parvati's laughter wore off, and she looked at her friends fondly.

Susan shook her head, smiling, and gave them both a hug and left for her room for the night.

Parvati reclined on her bed and turned to Hermione, who was watching a storm come in from the tiny mullioned window. She let her think quietly for a moment, and then she spoke to Hermione, softly. "You've thought about marrying Draco, then?"

Hermione seemed to expect the question. She turned and shook her head. "Not until five minutes ago. I'm not ready for that. But I did say that, didn't I? Is it mental?" Hermione wondered with a hint of worry behind the words.

Parvati smiled kindly. "No, it's not. That's what we fought for, really. For none of _before_ to matter once he'd asked for forgiveness. Does he love you, Hermione?"

Hermione nodded. "Yes."

"And you love him?"

"I do."

Parvati sat up on her pillows. "What does it feel like?"

Hermione wrinkled her brow. "Don't you know?"

"I don't think so."

Hermione studied her friend. "You and Seamus okay?"

Parvati nodded slowly. "Yeah, yeah, we are. I like him. A lot. I just don't know if I love him. I loved Lavender, and I think I loved her more when I lost her. So it's hard, you know? It's hard to compare, the love for my friend, the love for Seamus who is here. I mean, I fancy him...I like him...I just don't know what it is supposed to be like."

Hermione nodded. "The emptiness from my mum and dad, Harry, Ron, Fred, Tonks...all of it...he doesn't fill all the holes. He makes me feel like I have someone to share them with. He is the first person I want to tell anything to. I want to do things for him, not so he will like me more, but because I like him. He makes me feel better. I think he is the most handsome boy I've ever seen..." - at this Parvati nodded, appreciatively - "...and I think I'll feel that way long after I'm the only one who still believes that is true. I don't know if that is love, but it feels pretty good." Hermione smiled at Parvati.

Parvati looked out the window at the rain sluicing down. "Seamus loves me."

"Did he say so?"

"Afraid to, I think." Parvati gave a tight smile.

"Should he be?"

"Maybe."

The next morning, Hermione took a brisk early walk down to the greenhouses to get some potion ingredients for Professor Slughorn, when she spotted Neville quietly at work. Neville looked worn though he was effortlessly stacking sacks of fertilizer with his wand.

"Hey, Neville." Hermione called out cheerily.

"Hermione." Neville nodded with a sad smile.

Hermione stopped abruptly. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah. All is well. Bit off more than I could chew on wedding plans. Tried to make both Hannah and Gran happy," he grimaced. "I really needed to pick a side, and that side should have been my future wife's. Had a...spirited discussion last night. She's forgiven me, because she is perfect, but I'm feeling terrible about it. Just out here to think, really."

Hermione made a sympathetic face. "Sorry to bother you."

Neville shook his head. "Fine, really. Should stop wallowing."

"Can I ask you a question then, Nev?"

"Sure."

"How did you know you loved Hannah?"

Neville surprised Hermione by answering immediately. "We hid in a broom cupboard - that is when I got to know her, but I knew for sure when I kissed her."

"When you kissed her?" Hermione smiled, teasingly, inviting Neville to crack what Hermione imagined was the first smile since his argument with Hannah. "Nev, how many kisses do you have to compare?"

Neville shrugged, "Just Parvati, and Lavender...Padma..."

"What?" Hermione barked a laugh of shock.

Neville grinned slyly. "There wasn't much to do in the Room of Requirement last year. But Hannah, it was not just a snog. I just knew. Just then."

Hermione waved him off. "I'm sorry I don't seem interested in the answer to the question I asked you, but why haven't I heard of all of this snogging before? Am I really the last to know everything?"

Neville laughed. "Not memorable enough, I reckon. A fair amount of bored kissing. Probably would have snogged you too, had you been around."

Hermione snorted. "Who would have? You? Or Parvati?"

"We were really bored, Hermione." Neville laughed.

"Oh, Neville, this is very awkward," Hermione giggled.

Neville pulled a face. "Probably wouldn't have been for you," he winked jokingly. "I've been told I'm quite skilled. Lost your chance, though. Hannah hasn't wised up and chucked me yet."

Hermione batted at his sleeve, laughing.

Draco ambled down the path behind the greenhouses. He looked at the pair of them and raised his eyebrows, though his face showed no sign of irritation.

"Nev. Hermione."

Neville grinned at Hermione's face, which still held its earlier fluster. "Hey, Draco. I've got the dittany for you."

"Thanks for that. That potion takes longer to brew than I remembered. Saw your lessons. You are going to be good next year, Neville." It seemed to Hermione that once Draco had deeply felt and regretted everything he had said and done to Neville Longbottom and had been forgiven for it, he never missed a chance to give his new friend support.

"Thanks, Draco. That means a lot, from you."

"Because my father attempted to get half the teaching staff here fired at some point? Yes. You are welcome." Draco smirked. "Hey, love, can I walk you back to the castle?"

"No, thanks, still working." Neville replied, smoothly.

"You are really pushing it, you prat. I meant my girlfriend, whom you're never going to get that chance to snog."

Neville gave an amused look at Hermione who blushed furiously. She grinned apologetically at Draco, and took his hand to walk back to the castle.


	4. Hermione Is, Parvati Isn't

A/N: For all the kind messages and reviews, thank you. I love them. It is annoying when a story I am reading goes fallow, so I am sorry if you started this and liked it enough to wonder what my problem is. This chapter might run a bit short, and I am sorry for that also, but I am writing the next chapter now. Anyway. I hope you enjoy.

Hermione sat on an overturned pot outside of the greenhouses waiting for Neville to finish his tasks before they left for the castle. It was a pleasure to watch him settle cuttings into the earth that had taken root inside. With his wand, he made a slash in the thawed garden, and then with one deft maneuver, he lifted a cutting from a galvanized tray and settled it into the ground. She remembered the day he'd taken the cuttings, and the tender plants settled and took root as quickly as Parvati's scheme had. For just weeks after the friends had submitted their plans, Sprout had emerged with permission forms, packing lists, and tent assignments from McGonagall. The notion took root in Hermione's mind that she might learn as much from this experience as the undergraduates they were planning for.

Neville and Hannah had weathered their first frosty quarrel and seemed peaceful again; this too, after months of strained dealings with her parents and Mrs. Malfoy, comforted Hermione.

Neville broke into Hermione's quiet thinking. "Thanks for waiting for me."

"I enjoyed watching you work, Nev."

"Well," he smiled, looking at the vast rows of tender shoots, "you do enough of a thing….I guess that why no one is better at casting shield charms than you."

"Professor Flitwick probably is."

Neville laughed to himself. " Can you imagine taking Flitwick camping? Would we have to pack sparkling water and cherry syrup?"

Hermione squinted off in the distance at a crow picking at a pumpkin thawing in last season's compost. "Decorative cushions."

Neville bit his lip and nodded seriously, though his eyes weren't able to hide his amusement. "Yes. He would probably appreciate a decorative cushion whist roughing it."

Hermione grinned and tucked her arm through Neville's, and they began to walk. "Well, I never expected Parvati to want to leave the comforts of the castle, either."

Neville nodded, and they lapsed into a silent walk back to the castle. Ron and Harry pushed themselves out into the world, leaving the stark quiet of the lonely tent behind them. Hermione was wondering if she would also, or if she would accept this need for contemplation as part of herself. The advocacy work she once thought she might do in front of a bank of flying Quick Quotes Quills seemed like a worthy dream belonging to someone else. She had used her study time after completing her lessons to review law books, and she marveled at how a turn of phrase and the gaps of what wasn't enumerated gave rise to new laws and codes.

Reading had always been a private world for her, but it was now one that she could share with Draco, who was settling in with increasingly more advanced potions and charms texts. In a moment of anguish, Draco had wondered if Healing might atone for what he had done for his parents and Voldemort. Hermione wondered if law would have saved them all. And so they both spent more of their time together, in one common room or another, or at their table in the library facing each other, sometimes sliding a book back and forth. Hermione would wind a curl around her finger and chew her lower lip as she read, and Draco found himself watching, silently promising to be better for her.

It was after one of these afternoons that Draco insisted they pack. Hermione stepped over piles of gear in his room.

"We aren't even going to be gone for three whole days! Who is going to carry all of this?"

"House elves," Draco sniffed.

Hermione goggled at him and Draco rolled his eyes. "You are a bit tightly wound today. I'm sticking to the list, Hermione. Half of this stuff is for Dean. He is skint."

"Does Dean know you are funding his trip?"

Draco sighed. "I have money. He doesn't. It will be no fun watching him trying to make do with nothing."

Hermione watched him shrewdly. "Dean didn't forgive you because he thought you could give him things. Draco. You can't buy people."

Draco didn't look up from ticking items off a parchment list in front of them. "Oh, you definitely can, Hermione." He looked up at her with a smile to ward off a quarrel. "Look. I don't want to buy Dean. There is probably part of me that hopes that I can erase what I have done that easily, but I know that isn't how it works. Usually."

"What do you mean, usually?" Hermione gingerly stepped over a camping stove and sat in a nest of towels and folded jumpers.

"I met with Katie Bell and her parents right before our first day back here. That was...hard. Her parents especially. They thought I'd killed her. Almost did."

Hermione picked up a sleeping bag and rested her chin on it.

"I had to tell them the truth - that I wasn't sorry then that she touched the necklace. I was just relieved that I didn't get caught. That it took days of me being locked up in St. Mungo's to realize that my life wasn't worth more than hers, and then even longer to understand that my life was worth as much."

"What did they say?"

Draco nodded at the floor. "Her father said I was full of shite."

"But you weren't."

"Does it matter?" Draco shrugged. "Not to him. He said I was just as self-involved as before, worrying about my bloody soul. He had a good point. So I told him how much money I had to lose to make it hurt. And he could pick where it went."

Hermione blinked. "Where did it go?"

"Gryffindor Niffler Rescue."

Hermione looked up. "Gryffindor sponsors a niffler rescue?"

"You do now. Katie loves them. But to be clear, Mr. Bell said that if I came within twenty metres of Katie ever again, he would make me beg for death. So money, as you say, can't fix everything. Although it can make a father feel a bit better, I suppose."

Hermione looked out the window.

Draco watched her carefully. "We are leaving here forever very soon. I can't lie to you. Most of the appointments I have had with Carna lately are me panicking about what happens when you realize you deserve much better than to be with someone who is papered with injunctions."

Hermione nodded. "Reading law makes me argue in my head. I got out my mat, and went up to the Astronomy tower yesterday, and thought about that some more."

Draco froze and swallowed hard.

"And I thought to myself that maybe there was a part of me that was still eleven and worried about my teeth and my bossiness and that people weren't interested in the things that I knew. And that you, liking me now, was validation for insecurities I don't deserve to feel, some of which you helped to make. I wondered if what I feared most was that if you left me, the insecurities would all come flooding back, now, when I don't feel strong enough to fight them all off."

She watched Draco's shoulders sag, but she continued to speak. " I thought that maybe I was swapping being a villain's shadow when the hero whose shadow I'd grown up in had left me. I had to think about all of these things to make sure they weren't true. But I got the same answer I got before I forced myself to reason it out. I learned here that Harry and I weren't wrong because a teacher hated us or terrible things were said about us in the halls or in the papers. I knew we were good, because we were. So, I just need to think about if you are good, Draco. And you are, now."

Draco looked at her, and she wondered if he was breathing. She took a deep breath for them both. "Draco, even without me, you are good. And then there are the details. Ron is good, too. But we want different things. He likes being in the paper sometimes. And that is okay. It's okay." She stopped to think for a moment. It occurred to her that Draco was good at being quiet like Neville. She never remembered being listened to so much before.

"Harry likes the thrill of the fight, like Ron does. I like someone who will let me lean on his shoulder while we read. I like someone who will listen to a whole passage I read aloud and then ask me the right questions. I like someone who wears a fresh white shirt rolled up to the elbows...and, umm...someone who is looking at me just...like…."

In one swift move, Draco pulled the sleeping bag out of her hands and flipped a the folded towel between her head and the thin rug covering the stone floor. She supposed she had said everything she wanted to say.

"I'm afraid I'm going to have to stop you there, Hermione," whispered Draco as he looked her over, deciding where he wanted to start kissing her first. His pupils were wide, making his eyes dark. He didn't smile playfully, as he often did when they were in bed. He had an expression Hermione hadn't seen often before. She felt like he was seeing everything she had ever hidden, and for the first time in her life, she wanted to show someone all of her. He knelt slowly over her, and kissed her once, softly. Hermione could feel him tremble with restraint. She took his face in her hands, and they looked at each other, both letting their thoughts float in their minds unformed. Hermione closed her eyes and gently pulled him toward her for a kiss that said all of the things she couldn't yet say.

An hour later, Draco brushed a curl behind Hermione's ear and murmured. "You will do anything to avoid packing, won't you?"

Hermione grinned. "I was just going to say that packing is more pleasant than I had remembered."

Draco reached across her, kissing her mouth with a loud smack as he gathered her clothes. They dressed and finished with Draco's packing, and Draco bundled up his purchases for Dean and left to find him. Hermione went back to her room and saw that the door was open. Parvati was pacing back and forth in their shared doorway, and Susan was sitting on the floor with a copy of The Daily Prophet.

Parvati looked up and gave Hermione a searching look. She was twisting a butterfly ring on her hand.

"You have a letter, Hermione. Arrived just a bit ago." Susan waved at Hermione's room, where a parchment envelope lay on her desk.

Hermione turned back to Parvati. "What's wrong?"

"Everything! I'm crap at boys! This bloody War! These bloody Death Eaters! I can't have anything!" Parvati choked a sob and threw a camp cooking set. It disassembled with an echoing clatter against the stone floor.

Hermione looked at Susan, wide-eyed.

Susan sighed, glanced at Parvati for permission, and said, "Well, for starters, Seamus...surprised her this afternoon when he told her he loved her. And, um, she didn't react in the way he thought she would."

"I like him! He knows I do! Do we have to fall in love at the exact same time? Does he think there is a spell?" Parvati slammed a drawer in her bureau and then kicked the one below when it popped open.

"What happened, Pavati?" Hermione sank down onto her friend's bed and looked up at her. Parvati slumped and dropped next to her on the bed and let Hermione pull her close.

Parvati's voice sounded thick. "Seamus took me for a walk. He sat me down and told me he loved me. And I said it made me happy, but I wasn't there yet, and he looked so hurt. And I...got defensive. And then he got upset. And I don't know if he wants to come on this trip now. And-and then…." She waved at Susan, who looked up and held up the newspaper for Hermione to read.

"What am I looking at?" Hermione scanned the paper quickly; nothing was jumping for her attention.

Susan sighed. "Below the fold. Naenia Yaxley. She is the wife of the Death Eater. She avoided Azkaban in the inquiries, but there is a woman who has come forward to give a statement against her. Torture. Mrs. Yaxley has disappeared. The Aurors are searching around Balloch."

Hermione sat quietly. "Have you talked to Professor McGonagall? Surely she's aware."

Susan shook her head. "I was going to talk to all of you, and her, and then...Seamus, and it's just. No. We need to."

Hermione nodded. "Okay. Parvati, if Seamus loves you, if he really loves you, he isn't going to abandon you on something he knows matters to you. How, er, defensive did you get?"

Parvati leaned into Hermione and began to cry. "Pretty defensive."

Hermione sighed. "Go apologize. Not to keep your chaperone, to keep your...whatever you want him to be. Susan and I will go see if this woman missing near Loch Lomond is going to mean anything for us."

Susan pointed to the letter. "Don't forget your letter."

Hermione squeezed Parvati and went into her room to get the letter. It was from Harry.

Hermione,

I've missed you, and I'm sorry this is why I'm owling you now. I promise next time will be for a better reason!

I am sure you still get the Prophet - we are looking for Yaxley's wife to ask her some questions. She was last seen near the place you've planned to camp with the students this weekend. McGonagall thinks it's low risk and so do we, but she has asked Ron and me to join you to be quite sure. I know you can handle it, but we have Auror robes, and I am sure she thinks it will look better for the parents.

I hope you aren't angry.

I'm not sure how I feel about camping either. I will see you soon, I reckon.

Love,

Harry

Hermione went back to Parvati and Susan, and handed Parvati the letter. Susan bent her head near Parvati's, and they both read.

Hermione waited for them to look up to speak. "So, I think we are still on. Go talk to Seamus. I've got some packing to finish." Hermione left them both to go pack, lost in her own thoughts. Perhaps it was better to have something real to be guarding against - something more than the ghosts in her head.


	5. Ron and Draco Both

Hermione began her day early, the bell of her alarm prompting her to fumble for her clothes and her yoga mat. Usually, Carna would welcome her for morning meditation, but today, her door was closed, and Hermione could hear muffled voices from inside.

She decided to leave her mat propped by the door and take a walk down to the lake. It was a beautiful, pink morning, and Hermione soothed herself with knowing that the day would not hold loneliness, and the cold wouldn't creep past a Horcrux into her chest. It wasn't going to be easy for her today, though. She supposed half the battle was realizing it. _Battle_. _Perhaps another word for today would be helpful_. As her feet crunched over the gravel path, she listened hard to the silence, to the negative space between footfalls, trying to attach the quiet to this new warmth and peace that was stronger now than she it could ever be.

Her meditation was so focused that she did not notice the lanky figure sitting on the lone flat rock that jutted out several feet into the lake until he skimmed a stone across the pond.

"Ron?"

He didn't startle, for he'd heard someone approach who wasn't trying to be quiet. But when he heard Hermione's voice, he quickly moved to stand.

"Hey." He fiddled with his robes and looked at her nervously, and Hermione noted with a nostalgic twist in her chest that this, once, would have set her heart racing.

"Ron," she said again, warmly, and she walked to him for an awkward hug.

""I've...missed you." Ron said this as though he'd not given a name to how he'd been feeling before now.

She grinned at him and then softened her face, tilting her head up to his, reading him for an answer. "Is it hard to be back?"

He jammed his hands into his pockets and stood, bracing his body for the blow of memories. She watched him regard the castle.

"Harry says you don't want to be camping. I don't want to be at Hogwarts." A wave of grief flooded his face. Hermione stepped close to him and took his hand. Her head fell, and her gaze raked over the patterns of dead leaves thawing on the shore.

She wasn't sure why she felt guilt.

Ron bent his head down to hers, and the movement caught her attention, her eyes moving up to meet his. He smiled at her.

"Hey, I'm learning to play guitar."

'What?" Hermione was unprepared for the non sequitur.

"Yeah. I always wanted to learn. Have some money for one now. I'm taking lessons at a Muggle music shop. Thought George would take the piss, but he asks me to practice at night when he is home."

The layers of sadness, the need for a lullaby, were unspoken, but Hermione smiled, happy to hear that he was with George, happy to know Ron was making a path for himself, more than someone's brother, more than a hero's second.

"Parvati owes you for coming."

Ron huffed a small laugh. "Reckon this makes Harry and me even with the Patils, after the Yule Ball."

Hermione chuckled and looked off into the distance, and she was startled when Ron's intense gaze pulled her back to him.

"What would it take for us to be even, Hermione?"

Hermione gaped at him. "Even? What?"

Ron bit his lip. "I know it was wrong - to you - to give Draco a hard time at your party. I was glad to help you at that sham of a trial. I don't understand why you and him, but I don't need to understand to love you, Hermione. I want to get back to having you count on me. I...like Pip - Phillipa, very much. But I don't want to leave my friend Hermione Granger again.

Hermione's shallow breath gathered into a sob when she saw Ron's eyes brimming with tears. It was time for them to be the friends they were. He grabbed her into a hard hug, and she could feel his face buried in her hair, his tears like a baptism, their mistakes washed away.

They didn't hear his approach, but they heard the skid on the pebble path, and the scrape of a pivot to retreat. Draco had averted his eyes, his face pink, his hands jammed in the pockets of his corduroys as he gained speed back up the path.

Hermione looked at her arms, wrapped around Ron, and squeezed her eyes closed. Ron gently untangled himself and ran with long, loping strides up the hill after Draco, who sped up as he heard the chase.

Hermione wasn't interested in anyone fighting her battles, but she felt an odd pull to stay put and watch them. Ron seemed to know, perhaps from Auror training, how to avoid a fistfight, for he caught up ahead of Draco and ran past him, then stopped, his hands out in supplication. Draco stopped and freed his hands from his pockets, and Ron pocketed his, and moved beside him, and the pair walked up the hill away from Hermione's sight.

Hermione watched the path, though she could see them no more, and she wasn't sure what she was supposed to do. She took a deep breath and sat down on the rock, and placed herself in corpse pose, soaking up the weak autumn sun. She moved herself into a space of not thinking. She stayed there, unaware of time, until she heard two sets of feet back on the shore near her. She heard a pace quicken and Ron calling out, "Hermione!" She heard the second follow, and Draco called out, "She's okay, Ron. She's meditating."

Ron had reached her first, and she blinked against the morning sun and allowed him to help her up, but her eyes were on Draco, making sure of him. He was smiling. She turned to Ron. "Sorry, Draco's right. Just trying to calm myself. I wasn't sure what to do about you two."

Ron hugged her and murmured in her ear as though he were comforting her after a nightmare. "It's all okay. We're okay. I love you. Always."

He looked at her just long enough to seal this, and then he nodded at Draco and walked up to the castle.

Draco was silent as Hermione watched Ron walk away. She turned to him.

"What was that about?"

Draco sighed. "I thought you'd be down here, so I came to find you. I didn't know what I was seeing, but I didn't want a fight today. Ron told me that he was missing you, his friend."

"What did you say?"

"I said I thought you were missing him, too."

The tears pricking her eyes spilled over, and she started to cry again, stepping into Draco's chest, letting him fold his arms around her, and whisper promises to her. Ron would never leave her. And Draco never wanted her to leave him. They would chase the ghosts away, as she had done for them.

He smoothed her hair and wiped her tears, Hermione laughing with a shudder that Draco, only Draco, would offer her a monogrammed handkerchief, snow white, ironed into a perfect square. He kissed her forehead and put his arm around her, and Hermione could hear his sigh as she leaned into him.

"Thank you, Draco," she murmured.

"For what?"

"For letting him catch up with you. For trusting me. For wanting me to be happy."

Draco grinned. "The last two are a given. You are welcome for the first one. It's a damned shame you and I don't get our own tent tonight. I did get a bit of a scare. Was kind of hoping for you to be able to reassure me...for a few hours."

Hermione giggled. "I've never looked forward to a Sunday night before." Draco smirked and they made their way back to the castle.

* * *

Ignoring the buzz of excitement from the sixth and seventh year students in the Great Hall, the eighth years ate lunch together; Justin had joined them with Ron and Harry, and they used the time to discuss their plans and sort out details. Professor McGonagall swept in after the dishes had been returned to the kitchens, and she handed out rosters, assignments, and reminders. Dean had made a joke about spreadsheets being a turn-on for the women at the table, and Neville and Draco both watched as Seamus' mouth made a tight line as he pushed the papers away. Draco cocked his head toward the door, and it was only the rush of organization and the voices talking over one another that made Seamus and Draco's disappearance of no note to the rest of the group.

The group was starting to break up to gather their things when Seamus came back alone, with a determined look on his face that Hermione had seen before on Ron and on Draco, and she remembered the moments and knew what they meant. She looked at Parvati, who hadn't noticed his return.

"Parvati," Seamus said, gently, and he smiled when he saw her look up at him, and Hermione knew Draco had coached him to expect her to look flustered, harried, and distracted. "It's not a good time to talk, I know," Hermione's heart twisted when she could hear his Irish brogue deepen with nerves. "but I want you to read this, love, before we go, please."

He nodded and turned to leave, and the friends, even Harry and Ron, who had been away for some time, knew that this was a cue to gather their things and prepare to depart.

Hermione decided to stay, far enough down the table to leave Parvati to her thoughts and close enough to be a friend. She picked at a thread on her sweater and recited, in her head, a poem whose title she had lost a long time ago.

Parvati didn't acknowledge her presence until she spoke suddenly, her voice thick. "Do you want to know what it says?"

Hermione blinked at her. "Do you want me to?"

Parvati nodded. "It says...he says he didn't want to make me upset. He says he is going to do everything he can to make this weekend a success, and he says he..." - at this Parvati sniffed - "...he is proud of me. And he says...he says he loves me."

Hermione smiled reassuringly. "Let him. He's not demanding anything of you."

Parvati nodded, wiping her eyes on the sleeve of her jumper. "Yes. Okay. I just don't...I don't know." Hermione walked Parvati back to their rooms and gathered their packed bags while Parvati washed her face.

Hermione found herself cheered by the excited faces of her younger schoolmates. This is what would make it worth it, giving this opportunity to have some fun, to learn something useful, to the students who had suffered as much as she over the past few years. These students remembered Umbridge and the Carrows, and they were just beginning to get used to peace. Hermione closed her eyes and gathered the memories of these fraudulent professors, these trespassers, and visualized shoving them away into a cupboard under the stairs. With spiders. She smiled.

"Thinking about what we'll get up to Sunday night?" Draco whispered in her ear.

Hermione startled and opened her eyes. She grinned up at him, and she saw that he and the rest of her classmates had assembled and were resting their packs until they were ready to set off. Draco was smirking as he fastened a fishing pole to the side of his backpack.

"You own a fishing pole? Not a new one? You've been...outside?" Harry was examining Draco's backpack with an equal measure of curiosity and surprise.

Draco stifled an ugly look and sighed. "Potter, I grew up on an estate. Not in a _housing estate_." He flicked his eyes at Harry, and Hermione could hear the unspoken words Draco was visibly biting back. "I've hunted and fished for sport."

Dean snorted in amusement at this exchange, but Harry nodded thoughtfully as he considered it. "Fair enough. Never thought about it. You and Ron probably know more about roughing it than we did, before we had to." He turned to Ron, who was attempting to cram unfolded clothing into a pouch, "When you were growing up, did you..."

Ron and Draco looked up and said in unison, "Probably pushing it, Harry."

Ron and Hermione blinked in surprise. Dean let out a bark of a laugh and walked over to Susan, who was pulling her hair into a ponytail, an elastic in her teeth.

The moment was cut by an owl who swooped through the hall and landed on Ron's shoulder. He took the letter from it, and it flew out the great doors. Hermione didn't realize she was watching him read it until she saw his blush that deepened to match the pink of the notepaper. He smiled, dazedly and cleared his throat as he slid the note in his flannel shirt pocket. Hermione was caught as he looked up before she could look away.

"Pip says hi." Ron shrugged, failing to look nonchalant.

Hermione flicked her eyebrows in understanding. "Great," she said, with an embarrassed smile as Ron wandered off, presumably to think further upon the letter's contents.

Harry leaned in to mutter to her. "Every. Single. Day. Once, we were at the Burrow and Molly grabbed it by mistake." Harry began to chuckle, and Hermione joined in his laughter when Harry bubbled an odd giggle. "It was...so great. Just, oh..." Harry shook his head and pulled off his glasses, wiping his eyes on the sleeve of his jumper.

Harry's laughter was stilled by Professor McGonagall, who shot sparks from her wand to silence the crowd gathered.

"Sixth and seventh years, in addition to your tent assignments, you've been divided randomly into study groups. Your groups will rotate through working with eighth-year students, leaders who have written lessons for you which they will teach along the way. You will be required to write an essay about your experiences when you return, so it is imperative that you pay careful attention."

Any thought of groaning about the extra work was extinguished by the excitement of leaving and the fear of being pulled, at the last minute, to stay behind in the Hogwarts library doing revision with the unfortunate few that weren't joining the trip.

"You must stay with your group. You must follow your leaders' instructions, for though they are not professors, they are in charge. You must follow all the rules of our school, for though you are leaving its walls, you are still under its care and guidelines. Aurors Potter and Weasley are joining the group both as leaders and as protection. We are not worried you will need them in their professional capacity, but one must always practice..."

"Constant vigilance!" shouted a giddy seventh-year, who seemed as surprised by his interruption as McGonagall was. The younger students waited for her express her doubts about their behavior. Instead she looked off into the vague distance for a silent moment, and then at the now-mortified young man, and nodded.

"Indeed, Williams. Constant vigilance," she said, quietly. "Take care," she said. And with a flick of her wand, she opened the castle doors.


	6. Hermione Teaches the Unexpected Lesson

Harry quietly set off ahead of the group while Ron hung back to bring up the rear. Both of the men were here to work, so it was only Hermione who noticed the relief on Harry's face. It was enough challenge for him to even be here. Sometimes Harry needed his solitude.

Neville slowed his pace to Ron's, and Hermione could hear their easy banter in bits during rare lulls in the chatter of the students. Hermione had wondered if Ron might be lonely, for he had gone from the bosom of the Burrow to a Hogwarts with three of his brothers, and later Ginny. He left her and Harry in the desolation of the wilderness to the quiet acceptance of Shell Cottage. Neville seemed to seek him out with purpose, and Hermione noted Hannah skipped ahead to link arms with Susan, the two of them starting a Hufflepuff cheer that grinning students in yellow and black jumpers and scarves picked up, drowning out a laugh coming from Ron.

"Hufflepuffs! More than enough! Don't need a 'Claw to sort it out, No Gryffindor to shout it out, No Slytherin to cast a doubt, we'll cheer. With cheer. And if you're good enough, to love a 'Puff, you'll know it, you'll know it. Whoooooo!"

Hermione looked up at Draco, who squinted into the lowering sun ahead of them and pulled a face. He reached behind him to pull the cap McGonagall had given him out of his pack and jammed it on his head. He smiled as he felt her eyes on him, and he looked down at her, grabbing her hand and giving it a squeeze before letting go. Hermione sighed, her mind blissfully clear, save the pleasure of being with him and feeling safe outside the castle walls.

Dean grinned as he jogged past them to the head of the group, slowing his pace as he carefully walked backwards. He put his thumb and forefinger in his mouth and gave a piercing whistle that caused the first row of students to hunch reflexively from the volume.

"Yeah, I know the charm to raise my voice," he grinned at the front row, who were blinking off the ringing in their ears. "But we need to remind you, or in some cases teach you," - at this he winked at a group of Slytherins who were eyeing him warily, "how to weave the two together. We never plan to lose our wands, but I can attest it happens just when you need them the most. So first, a bit of magic. If you need to make your own path, do as I do. Bit better than a severing charm, I've found." Dean did an exaggerated wand movement and slowly recited a spell, and then he did them together, severing a thorny branch hovering menacingly in front of him. "Now the path narrows. Come up in pairs, clear a bit in front of you, then go to the back and give the next pair a go. Finnegan's coming up with an _Aguamenti_ at the ready in case you take a page from his book and try to blow up a tree."

Hermione grinned as she heard a growl of "Sod off, Thomas!" coming from a clot of students ahead of her, followed by some chuckling. The students did quick and tidy work of widening the path, and as the last pairs were coming forward, Hermione sped her pace to make her way to the front for her first lesson. The students had been given jars from the kitchens to pack, and Hermione taught them all to conjure a bluebell flame, and then showed them how to keep it hovering in front of them, lighting the steps in front of each in turn. The students had little difficulty, save for one Gryffindor who'd scared Hermione into thinking, for one dreadful moment, that the girl had stuck her jar onto her forehead permanently. Having sorted her, Hermione let the group flow past her, appreciating the snake of blue dots winding up the tightly curving trail.

Draco caught up to her and pulled her to him, kissing her firmly on the mouth. "Sexiest teacher at Hogwarts."

Hermione laughed and shoved him playfully on the arm. "Not saying much, is it?"

Before Draco could answer, Seamus admitted, "Professor Sinestra's a fine bit o' stuff."

"Hell, yes," Draco and Dean answered together firmly and then high-fived in celebration of their newfound fraternity.

Hermione opened her mouth to protest when Ron called out from the back of the group, "Ask her about Lockhart!"

Hermione clamped her mouth shut and whipped around to see Ron grin at her, disarmingly. She turned forward and called over her shoulder, "Traitor!" as Dean and Draco nodded grins back to Ron, who was laughing with Neville.

Any further discussion was halted as they came to a sharp drop on the trail; they were at the top of a bluff overlooking a swath of valley and a small river. This was the place they were set to camp for the night. It was beautiful, with slabs of rock jutting out of verdant patches of green. Harry moved forward with Ron and the eighth years to show them how to set up a tent with magic and without, for many of them had not done one or the other, and there were some who'd not done either before. When they were done, Harry looked at Hermione with a tender expression that Hermione read as nostalgia and sadness, and she moved forward to show the gathering how to ward the campground. Her usual firm tone was dampened, and the students grew silent to hear her, making the space a solemn sanctuary.

"I've written the spells on parchment for you. They are coming around now. You will ward your own tents this evening for practice." Hermione's benediction ended with a nod, and she shuddered a sigh she couldn't explain. She walked to the edge of the river alone and watched as Seamus and Parvati called the students toward them to make fires for cooking and light.

Draco was by her side, and he didn't say anything for several minutes as they watched the water scramble around the rocks that had fallen from the banks.

"Brought back some things, didn't it." Draco said flatly as he stared at the river, his face blank.

"Yes."

He waited, and she finally spoke what he needed - but was afraid to - ask. "After a while, it was a reflex, a ritual, the wards. And then there was one time, when I had burned a lunch and went without, and I was wearing the Horcrux, and I was impatient with Harry and hurt by Ron, that I couldn't remember if I'd done them or not. So I had to cut it into myself, like Umbridge's foul quill, why I was doing them. I would imagine Voldemort killing Harry. I would picture Greyback tearing Ron apart. And then I would wonder what you would do with your opportunity to show me what you thought about Mudbloods."

Draco looked at her like she'd punched him in the gut. He'd lost his voice when he whispered, "Did you think I would kill you? That I would torture you?" His voice held no accusation, and he'd long since moved past wanting to protect himself from what she could say.

Hermione sighed. "No. I really didn't. I thought you were jealous of me, and truthfully, I did know there was something else there, something that would make you angry at the both of us, but not murderous. I was never afraid of you." She looked at him, and he saw that she hadn't been afraid of him for many reasons, the least of which being her imagining - astutely - his complicated feelings for her at school. "No, Draco. But I did think that Harry and Ron could die, and that made my hands shake too badly to do the spells. Thinking of you just made me...determined." She bit her lip and smiled. "Oddly, I suppose it still does."

"Oddly, I am here now to be grateful you kept yourself safe. From me."

Hermione smiled another small smile. They stood, not touching, until they smelled the smoke from the fires.

Those who had spent tedious weeks in the Room of Requirement were teaching cooking spells and charms to each group of students huddled around a campfire. They had been given tins of beans and loaves of bread, and they were cheerily toasting this simple meal made exciting by its novelty. Draco quietly guided Hermione over to a big fire surrounded by their friends, and Seamus and Parvati were supervising the grilling of steaks over glowing coals.

Draco blinked at the preparations, and Parvati misread his interest. "Handy spell to rush a fire along, isn't it? Just seconds, and it's ready to throw on the food."

"Why not beans?" Draco wondered.

Harry's voice called up to him from the ground, where he had spread a blanket and was laying on it, looking up at the stars, his hands behind his head. "There are certain things we just can't do yet. Or maybe ever. I can't eat food from a can anymore. Tried beans once after a late night at the Ministry. Made me ill. War's fashioned me inot such a gourmet," Harry snorted.

Draco swallowed and nodded.

Ron grunted in agreement. "I've had to come home from training and go for a run to keep from putting on an extra stone. Mum cooks...more than she needs to."

Draco and Hermione's eyes met in full understanding at this. He put his hand on her back. They let this hang in the air, and then Ron, with a voice of forced cheer, continued, "Having said that, Pip made us biscuits. I think she wanted to do something. Taking a page from my Mum, apparently."

They all murmured appreciatively and began to sort out their utensils from their packs. Soon the smells of food made their focus fully on dinner, and Dean and Seamus started in on some old Hogwarts stories that Hermione had never heard. Dean's tale from the Yule Ball left her stomach hurting from laughter, and she was happy to realize that she was truly hungry. The food was delicious, made better by the smoke of the fire, and Ron passed the biscuits around before their plates were even empty.

One of the students had packed a wireless and charmed it to amplify a rare ballad from The Weird Sisters which boomed unnaturally into the valley. Some groups were huddled around their fires gossiping, but a few students jumped into the clearing to dance. Dean casually flicked a _scourgify _at Susan's empty plate and pulled her up to dance, grinning as she slid her arms around his neck. Seamus folded his arms and pretended to supervise the other campers when Parvati put a hand in his and gently walked him into the clearing. He took her hand in his and tucked it in between them, drawing her close, their heads touching.

Ron looked at the couples and sighed. "Biscuit, Harry?" He passed his friend the tin.

Harry popped one in his mouth as he stood up, brushing himself off. "You kids have a nice time dancing. I'll just stand guard here." He managed a smirk through a mouthful of chocolate and waved Hermione and Draco off as he loped to the other end of the clearing.

Draco looked guilty, a look that Hermione expected probably was new to him, all things considering. "He's teasing, Draco. Let's dance, okay?" She leaned into him, and he sighed. Hermione could feel knots in his shoulders, and she wondered if they were from the pack today or what he'd carried with him for months. The song ended, and he took her hand and walked her over to a group that had a few sixth-year Slytherins sitting quietly by the fire.

"Did you scrubs enjoy your beans on toast?" He smirked at the students who forced a dry laugh from their worried faces.

"Beats scrubbing the common room after that Puddlemere upset, Draco." This made them all chuckle quietly.

"Tomorrow I'm teaching a fishing lesson for everyone who doesn't know how. Got some good lure charms. Pretend to be interested, and I might let you clean my catch."

"Thanks, Dolores," muttered a seventh-year Ravenclaw under her breath. She looked horrified to have been heard when Draco forced a laugh and added, "There will be no need to talk." He stood up, giving one last careful look at the Slytherins. "Alright, you tossers. And you Hufflepuffs. I'll be back to tuck all of you in later and hear your prayers. Try not to set the tent on fire; it'll take more than a _Reparo _to sort it."

He smiled tightly, and Hermione followed him back to their group. They could hear the chatter bubble from the students they'd just left.

"Draco Malfoy. Bringer of Good Cheer Under Duress," he sighed. "I suppose Parvati was right, Hermione. This is important. They need to know these things, but they need to just be young. I suppose I need to figure out if I'm too old for that, too." He smiled at her, and then sighed. "Did you see how I scared that Ravenclaw? Sometimes, I thank Merlin for Carna throwing me a rope, and sometimes I wish she'd just handed me a noose. Comes when I least expect it. Like just then."

Hermione nodded. "You've been braver this year than I ever would have imagined."

Draco smiled a thank you. "Hard to swallow but easier to digest. I'm getting dreary. Let's go back to dancing."

Hermione took his hand, and they made their way back over to their friends, who were dancing to something uptempo. Neville was different from the boy who stepped all over Ginny's feet at the Yule Ball; he and Hannah were dancing so well that Dean and Anthony were cheering them on. Dean leaned back to talk to her and Draco.

"Another thing we missed from being hidden in Hogwarts. Kissing, cooking, and dancing. They are having a hard time convincing me it was terrible."

Draco twirled Hermione into the group, and they lost themselves in the beat. The wireless obliged with a happy mix of songs, and Hermione even heard herself giggle with Parvati as they remembered one they'd danced to, years ago, in a rare dormitory party.

The wireless grew louder with static, and they all looked over to see who'd turned the dial. Justin frowned and stepped forward to retune it, but froze as he heard talking coming through the static. A familiar voice rang out into the clearing.

"...Point is, people, don't get lulled into a false sense of security, thinking he's out of the country. Maybe he is, maybe he isn't..."

Hermione froze, the scream formed but unable to escape her throat. Her head whipped around to find Ron, who had gone gray at the sound of his brother's voice, ringing brightly from the box.

"...but the fact remains that he can move faster than Severus Snape confronted with shampoo when he wants to..."

Draco shrugged off Hermione's hand, holding her back with his palm, and marched toward the wireless with his wand out.

"...so don't count on him being a long way away if you're planning on taking any risks. I never thought I'd hear myself say it, but safety first!"

He was only feet away when it exploded.

The group ducked as one, and Hermione was able to release the scream, which was instantly chorused. Neville was pointing at the smoking remains of the wireless, his wand hand shaking. "Perhaps I should have just done a _Silencio_," he muttered, as his hand dropped limply to his side.

Harry was marching over to them, his eyes ranging over the whole crowd, his jaw clenching. Draco looked at Hermione and jerked his head at Ron as he pulled a splinter of wood off his wool jumper. She nodded and rushed over to him, and Draco he started pacing the perimeter of the group, already scanning the darkness.

"Ron."

"I have work to do. Please let me get on with it," Ron muttered, but Hermione could hear the shaking behind his voice. She pulled out her wand and matched his swift strides at a jog. She could see Harry calling out to Draco, who had his wand out and was opposite them, conjuring a silvery otter which shot back to Hogwarts. Draco kept pace with Ron and Hermione at the opposite endpoint of the circle's diameter, tense and moving just within the wards. She could hear Parvati, Susan, and Hannah calling for calm and ordering all campers into their tents, Hannah reassuring an embarrassed Gryffindor blinking away tears that it really was time for them all to go to bed anyway; they were all safe. There were Aurors here.

The eighth-year students were joined by Ron and Harry when nothing followed the eerie rebroadcast of Fred's voice.

"What the fuck was that?" growled Seamus, as he put his hand on Ron's shoulder, protectively.

Harry looked at his Muggleborn friend, the only one that might know enough about both worlds. "Hermione, are Wizarding Wireless programs recorded? Is there a way..."

"No, I don't think so," Hermione shook her head. "I need to look some things up, but I am wondering if it was, perhaps, my wards. I did simple ones for the students, but I went b-back...habit, I guess...and did my...o-others. I wonder...maybe if they held things in, more than keeping things out. I've been feeling rough tonight," she looked at Draco, unwilling to share what she knew about his feelings this evening, and..."

"Me too," Ron clipped. "Didn't help, hearing that just now. But yeah, it feels horrible. Not like wearing..." He looked up at Hermione, and then Harry. "Just sad. Fought it all night. Thought it was...other things."

Hermione nodded. "Harry. Let me take these wards off. You do yours, please. Have the students do theirs. Then I think we should all go to bed. Should I keep...?" She frowned as she realized she was offering to keep watch as she'd done for months with them. _Constant vigilance._

Draco shook his head. "Please go check on your tent, and call into mine to see if they are okay. Tell Woodruff he's going to be doing the wards tonight for our tent. I'll keep watch in front for a while. I don't know what for exactly. Just not tired."

Harry and Ron nodded. Harry looked like he wanted to wave Ron toward a tent but nodded his head toward the edge of the clearing, and the two went off to ward the perimeter. Hermione raised her wand and removed her magic protections, and then she rushed to check on the students they'd shooed into their tents. The only sounds she could hear was the rushing of the river and the quiet voices muffled by canvas tents.

**A/N: Thanks for reading - this story and "Charms" are so different from the shorter things I've been challenged to write lately, that it takes me a bit to get back into dramastride. :D But this chapter has been a long time in coming, and hugs to Bumblebeer who gets full credit for the wireless playing Fred.**


	7. Draco Demonstrates Practical Spells

**A/N: Such a long chapter, oh dear. But I was worried about splinching, you see. **

Hermione couldn't lie still without hearing Fred's cheeky voice banging in her head, a rogue firework bouncing in her skull. She was grateful the girls in her tent were sleeping, and she didn't feel danger, nor could she perceive any. She summoned a jar and conjured the soft blue flame which set an eerie glow to the room. She fished in her pack for paper and pencil, quieter than the scratch of quill on parchment, and much more sensible to pack. With these, she composed a letter she could send in the morning; though she wasn't afraid, somehow it seemed prudent to stay in the tent for the night.

_Dear Philipa,_

_Thank you for making biscuits for Ron to share with us. They were delicious and gone before we could fight over seconds. Do you share recipes?_

_I don't want to overstep my bounds as Ron's friend, so forgive me, but I wanted to tell you I am worried about something that happened to us tonight. We were all listening to the wireless, and Fred's voice came through. I remember listening to the same broadcast during the War. We are wondering if it had something to do with the wards I placed around us. I don't have to tell you how upset it made us all, and I imagine being on duty and without you for company made it harder. _

_I'd like it if we could all go out sometime so we can get to know each other better._

_With warm regards,_

_Hermione_

The note sounded meddling and lonely and silly to Hermione, but she supposed she was a bit of each. It felt odd to her to be so protective of Ron and yet hoping for another woman to comfort him. She promised herself to send it in the morning, even if she thought better of it then. She'd sent - and received - a few awkward letters from Viktor, yet they were always preferable to the ones she did not receive from her parents. Writing this letter let her mind grow drowsy, and after she folded the letter and put it in her pack, she let herself be drawn into sleep.

Hermione stretched as she awoke, hearing the soft breathing of the girls instead of the low rumbles of Harry and Ron's voices that greeted her for months. Without having to sort through her belongings or remember how she'd packed them as the girls had to the night before, she was able to quickly pull out clothes and wash and dress. She wondered, as she assembled her gear for the day, if she slept better on a night of fear, for she felt wonderfully rested this morning. She found a calm owl perched on the tent, a Hogwarts crest on its leg strap, and she sent her message off before she could change her mind.

She saw Ron and Harry at the edge of the clearing drinking something steaming out of tin camping cups.

"Morning," she said as she approached them, giving Harry a quick hug and Ron a comforting one joined by a searching look. "I sent Pip a letter thanking her for sending the biscuits along. I'd like us all to go out sometime, if you'd like it."

"And told her about Fred. I know. Harry did, too. You both are as bad as Percy was in school." He pursed his lips in annoyance. "Least you're glad she's there, I guess."

Harry absently stepped close to Ron and shoved his hands in his pockets, giving Ron an affectionate smile. Ever since Ron came back and destroyed the Horcrux, Hermione had noticed the two behaved much like the twins had to each other. Harry turned to Hermione. "Sorry, but Professor Flitwick thinks it could have been the wards, too. You can't feel shame about it, but I thought you should know. He wants to go over the ones you used when you get back - maybe it can keep things like that from happening again to you."

Hermione hugged herself and nodded. She raised her eyebrows and took a breath. "Well, Draco's teaching fishing today. If memory serves, you both should pay attention."

Ron smirked. "Long as you aren't cooking our catch."

Hermione gave him a playful shove, and he grinned tiredly.

The students were in charge of making their own breakfasts, and Parvati showed them some efficient cleaning spells. Neville began the day with a walk to a nearby wood he'd scoped out before the trip and had found several medicinal and edible plants. He, more than the others, treated this like a formal Herbology lesson, requiring the students to take notes and drawings of the plants he identified for them, reminding them all that unlike many of the lessons they'd had so far, ignoring his could prove fatal. Hermione found that she learned many things herself and enjoyed watching Neville teach, his posture relaxed, his face animated. She nudged Hannah and pointed to the front two rows of students, which were interestingly composed entirely of girls who were staring at him with glazed smiles unless he prompted them to write in their notebooks.

"Professor Longbottom does have a magnetic air of gravitas, doesn't he, Anthony?" Justin whispered from behind them and then stifled a laugh when Anthony rolled his eyes and dragged him over to talk with Ron and Harry.

Hannah grinned wickedly at Hermione and then settled herself quietly in the front row, serenely listening to Neville, her presence prompting several students to shift in their places and affect a more studious air.

Hermione turned to go see what needed to be done next and bumped into Draco, who took her arm and marched her into a lonely copse of trees.

"You know everything Neville's teaching right now. I think you can skive off," he murmured as they walked.

Hermione raised her arms in amused protest. "I did learn some things!"

"Like how much work he's going to have to do to keep his students from daydreaming about him in class? Longbottom. Dreamy. Who would have thought?" Draco smirked.

"I think we can add that to a long list of Who-Would-Have Thoughts, darling."

Draco nodded distractedly. "Indeed. Thank Merlin for that list. Ah. Here we are." Draco backed himself into a large tree, and pulled Hermione up on a low rock sunk into the earth next to it. She grinned at the height she'd gained as he pulled her to him with a jerk and kissed her, his hands lingering on her hips long enough for her to sense their warmth before he glided one up her back and the other to her hair. She responded in kind, her hands ranging over his chest, breaking his kiss to feather her own kisses on his jaw and his neck, eliciting an appreciative moan from her boyfriend, who raked his thumb along the line of skin above her blue jeans. He ducked his head and captured her lips again for a kiss so dizzying she wrapped her arm around him for balance, sliding the other under his cotton Henley undershirt, her fingertips gliding over his stomach. He grabbed her bum and ground himself into her, and she gasped and kissed him hard.

After several moments they both pulled away, their breathing shallow and fast.

"That was," Draco gasped, "at once...the best and worst idea I've had this whole weekend. I thought you'd just give me something nice to think about while I watch Ravenclaws struggle with lures. Now, I am going to have to not think about this...At. All."

Hermione chuckled huskily into his neck. "Least you won't be bored. Is this the part where I say something about your rod?"

Draco gave a weak laugh. "You can say anything you want to me right now. Except for _I'm breaking up with you_. Please don't say that. At least give me Sunday night." He laughed, shifting and stepping away from her slightly, "I'm thinking of about six different ways that could go down, and they all include you with fewer clothes."

"It's a date," Hermione whispered, grabbing him for one final, slow kiss that hovered on escalating before she gently pushed him away.

"God. You have no idea how much I love you, Hermione."

"I'm beginning to get an idea, Draco." She looked up at him with a thoughtful look on her face.

He smiled at her with a tender smile so sudden in its change from his smirking banter that Hermione lost her breath again. He breathed a shallow laugh and used his hand to comb her curls back into some order, and then he slid it down to button the bottom two buttons of her flannel shirt. Winking at her, he tucked his shirt back in and ran his fingers through his hair with a sigh and took her hand to walk her back to the campground.

They met Dean and Susan talking quietly at the edge of the camp.

Susan looked up, "Oh, where have you...Oh." She stopped herself, having taken in their flushed cheeks and their fingers woven together, Hermione crossing her other arm to latch on to Draco, holding his arm with her free hand. "Missed a button there, Hermione."

Hermione gave a little gasp and buttoned the button in the middle of her shirt, looking at a sheepish Draco out of the corner of her eye.

Dean cleared his throat. "Where are we setting up?"

Draco squinted at the sunlight glinting off the water. "Fly fishing is challenging; I can show them some magic to help with that. I think we will fish without magic in that pond south of here; it looks like it's stocked." he pointed with his wand.

Dean nodded. "I'll help. Just don't make me eat it like the Goblins like it."

Draco laughed. "Deal."

Hermione watched the students watching Draco and Dean in the water, their jeans and boots charmed to stay dry. Soon a few students waded in while others practiced charms on shore. Harry and Ron grabbed poles and gave it a go; Ron was pleased when he caught a large salmon after only a few minutes. She smiled as she saw him remove the charmed lure from the fish's mouth and place it on a pile of ice, grinning at Draco who cheered on the catch. A few Gryffindor girls set the pace for their catches, and soon the tub of ice was filled with fish, which Neville showed them how to quickly clean with magic, and Dean pulled out a sharp knife to demonstrate how to clean a fish quickly without a wand, though he let Neville vanish the mess after.

Draco took an interested group over to the pond with Parvati and Susan, who were sitting on the grassy bank with poles out and wands away. Hermione went back to the campground and started fresh fires, and Hannah levitated a stack of sodden cedar planks over, spraying them again with her wand.

Hannah studied Hermione as she busied herself with the fires and watched Seamus whistle as he chopped wood by hand.

"Seamus seems a bit happier," Hannah mused.

"He does, doesn't he? I suppose Parvati's not shrugging him off at the moment," Hermione said.

"Doesn't look as happy as Draco." Hermione expected to see Hannah smirk, but she looked thoughtful. "I don't think I've really seen him happy before. And now he just...well, it's quite a change."

Hermione smiled. "It is. I think we were both tired of fighting, and then we discovered the reason why."

"I started to notice Neville looking at me like that just before..." Hannah looked away, deciding something. "Hermione, you should think about what you would say to Draco if he were to ask you to marry him."

"What? Why would you think that? It's only been a few months." Hermione blinked in shock. _Surely people weren't thinking..._

"It's been an intense few months. Years. I knew he was..._interested_ in you for years. But now that it is clear to him what that can mean...what he can have...well, you should just think about what you would say."

Hannah pretended not to notice that Hermione stopped building a fire, and she smoothly worked around her frozen friend. Hermione was unnerved by the absence of feelings that she'd expected to feel. She didn't feel awkward. She didn't feel scared. She didn't feel nervous. She wasn't sure what she did feel, but she gathered her breath and smiled at Hannah, who had finished refreshing the fires, which were all crackling merrily.

The students had wandered away from the unwarded campsite, and this occurred to Hermione at the exact moment she heard another crack, louder than a pop of damp firewood. A blonde woman, staggering from apparition, had stumbled into their campground. Physically she was unimposing, but her venomous face was enough for Hermione to whip her wand around and Stun her without a second look. Hannah's eyes grew wide as she shot a red stream of sparks in the air, which made Harry and Ron run toward the clearing so fast that Hermione, in her mind racing faster than time, wondered if they had learned to fly like Snape had. She summoned the witch's wand, and stuck it in her back pocket.

"Yaxley! How did you know? Did she say anything?" Harry rushed toward the woman with Ron, and they immediately bound her with a coiling, silvery rope.

"She didn't have time!" gasped Hannah. "Hermione stunned her before I could turn around!"

Hermione blinked at Mrs. Yaxley and waved her wand, awakening her. She kept her wand out, but she knelt down in front of the woman.

"Mrs. Yaxley. I knew your husband. Or his essence, translated by Polyjuice. He isn't going to get out and get at you." Hermione said these things before thinking, as if Professor Trealawney were running in her head, waving incense.

Mrs. Yaxley blinked at tears running down her face. Hermione pulled a handkerchief out of her pocket and wiped her cheek dry, despite Mrs. Yaxley pulling away. In that moment, Hermione decided that if Mrs. Yaxley spat at her, the woman would be picking wiggly bogeys out of her nose for a decade. "If you've done something, you must tell the truth. Draco Malfoy is here, did you know? It's too late for Voldemort, but there is still time to save your soul."

Mrs. Yaxley snarled. "There is no justice."

"You may wish there weren't, Mrs. Yaxley, but I assure you the Ministry won't do to you what your husband did to the Cattermoles."

"Mary," breathed Mrs. Yaxley.

Hermione pursed her lips in a thin line and looked up to see her friends staring at her, wands drawn. Draco practically lifted Parvati aside to get to Hermione, but she held out her hand, keeping her eyes on Mrs. Yaxley. "Naenia, Mary is alive. Her husband and children are, too. If you do what is right, you may have time to let go of what your husband did to you and make amends to the people who loved you, once. You are going to go to the Ministry now. Your husband tried to kill these Aurors. They won't let any harm come to you, Naenia."

Harry muttered quietly to Ron. "I'll take her in. You stay here, in case the students start Owling home. I'll send my Patronus when we get there."

"Come along, Mrs. Yaxley. I'm assuming by your sudden arrival you are fine with apparation." Hermione handed Harry the wand, and he heaved the woman to her feet and spun them away.

Ron leaned into Hermione. "What the hell was that?"

Hermione closed her eyes in a brief surrender. "Mrs. Yaxley and I both loved a man who looked exactly like Mr. Yaxley. The Ministry. It was you, but it wasn't. An interesting sisterhood. Came to me suddenly, remembering you, as him. Yaxley smelled of violence."

Ron looked at Hermione with love no longer marred by regret. "Why, Hermione, I do believe that was amazing." He whispered in her ear, "The first time you didn't quote a book in your answer. I shall remember it always." He pulled a face, putting his arm around her and gave her a squeeze. "You okay?"

Hermione knew Ron had much more patience with Hermione's nerves than Harry had, but for once she was completely unruffled. "Yep." She grinned at him.

Draco made his way to her, and Ron stepped away to let him stand in front of Hermione, holding her shoulders and searching her face, ignoring the crowds of chattering students that had gathered around the place Harry and Mrs. Yaxley had just vacated. "Are you okay?"

Hermione smiled happily. "Perfectly, yes. Nice to know that my reflexes are better than my wards." They looked up to see a stag burst through the wood into the clearing of the campground.

Harry's voice rang from it. "Well, I have her tucked in a cell here for now, but Kingsley wanted to interview her personally. Said I should probably head back. Taking a shower first. That woman was ripe." The stag nodded its head and faded to a glimmer and nothingness.

Seamus' voice rang out. "I believe you all have some supper to prepare, so go to it!" He waved his hands and shooed the students to the fires near their tents.

..o0O0o..

The students began cooking, and Harry made it back for a fresh salmon supper. Parvati and Seamus were talking quietly at a small fire they had to themselves, and the other eighth years sat lazily and finally relaxed, staring into the fire.

"Get your guitar out and play us something, Ron," Justin called, and Ron pulled his guitar from the case and tuned it softly before playing one intricate melody that blended into another. Hermione leaned against Draco's chest, lulled by his heartbeat and the music, but her drift toward sleep was ended when he carefully lifted her up so he could stand.

"Go to bed, love. Been a long day. We'll stay up," he murmured, and kissed her gently, steering her toward her tent. She stopped before opening the flap as she watched him walk along after Ron, who had stopped playing when his acoustic version of a Weird Sisters song gave way to happy singing from several fires. She saw Ron loping stiffly toward his tent and Draco catching up with him. The two men were illuminated in the firelight, standing with their backs to Hermione, Ron's arms folded over the neck of the guitar in front of him, Draco's jammed into his pockets. They talked quietly for several minutes, and when the pull of sleep was greater than her curiosity, she tucked herself into her sleeping bag.

The next morning she heard sharp voices, panic mixed with fury, coming from Anthony and Susan. She threw on a jumper and scrambled out of her tent.

"Damn. Them!" Anthony roared. "I caught them once trying to wander off! I should have sent them back to the castle then!" He shot a silver shape that moved with such force, Hermione couldn't see its form.

Susan was rummaging through her tent and hauled out a sleepy student, shaking her awake. "Meredith and Jasper. Where," she barked at her.

The girl looked sheepish. "Close, I'm sure. Look in that forest we did Herbology in. Think they just wanted to be alone before term ends. Sure they are fine." Tousled heads began poking out of tents, looking bemused.

Harry and Ron strode over, weary and annoyed. Harry growled at no student in particular, "We had VOLDEMORT chasing us, and it was less trouble than you lot! Wandering off!"

Ron sighed. "I'll go."

"No," Harry clipped. You were up half the night with that jumpy group, throwing wards and charms around because they didn't bring their teddy bears. Ridiculous. I'll go look. Anthony, Susan, perhaps you would like to join to have the first go at them when they are found?" The three apparated to the first line of trees in the wood, and Hermione could see them, small in the distance, enter, wands aloft and glowing.

Ron rubbed his eyes and nodded at Hermione. "Now this feeling brings back some memories. We should do this again, sometime." He snorted, and Hermione smiled absently as she rubbed her arms in the cold. "Go get dressed, you," Ron grinned at her.

Hermione nodded and turned as Draco was coming out of his tent, his hair ruffled, wearing a pair of grey sweatpants and a Slytherin t-shirt. "Bloody hell, what," he mumbled, as he pulled her in to bury his nose in the top of her head.

"Hufflepuffs ran off to cuddle. Missing."

"Ugh," he grunted. "Need a search party?"

"Susan and Anthony and Harry. I think they will find them soon." Hermione waved toward the trees.

"Why would two fine, young Hogwarts people be so selfish to want to snog by themselves? The nerve." Draco rubbed his eyes and smiled sleepily at Hermione, who put her arm around him.

They were both startled by the sound of a loud bang and the sickening sound of flesh hitting stone. They spun around and saw Ron pinned to the rock under Jasper, who had seemingly tried to apparate back and missed his mark. Draco was running toward them before Ron let out a shout of pain. Hermione unfroze her feet and followed making it in time to jump out of the way of Jasper, whom Draco had thrown off of Ron.

"Jasper, you bellend! Get my bag from my tent! Go!" Draco shouted at him as he bent over Ron to look at his head, which was oozing blood where it had hit the rock. A stain on Ron's shoulder was blossoming scarlet, and Draco sliced his shirt open to see the wound.

"Ron!" Hermione cried. "That's where he splinched himself!"

"Merlin, I can tell. It didn't mend well." Draco murmured to himself.

"We were in the woods!" Hermione felt a surge of guilt from what she perceived as a commentary on her healing abilities.

"Yes," said Draco, ignoring her. "_JASPER!" _Draco bellowed. This worked as a summoning charm, and the flustered Hufflepuff dropped the bag at Draco's feet and backed away. Draco seemed to ignore it, muttering over Ron, waving his wand, but he soon fished out a bottle and pulled the cork with his teeth, pouring the contents into Ron's mouth. Ron had turned white, his eyes rolling in the back of his head.

Neville ran over when he heard Draco shout. Draco was touching Ron's head with his wand, murmuring an incantation. "Hey, Nev. We find any hellebore in the woods yesterday?" Draco said this so casually, Neville blinked at him for a moment.

"Yeah, we did. Hold on."

Draco fished out a bottle of dittany and a soft flannel and chanced a quick look at Hermione. "Love, I'm going to lower him on his side with his shoulder up. Very carefully. His neck isn't broken, but his head's a mess. Can you put some of this on it while I look at this shoulder?"

Hermione had to force breath in - the grayness of the day, the bloom of red soaking into the ground, Ron's red hair against that same white face she remembered from the Splinching - she squeezed her eyes shut for a second to keep from screaming and then began to pat his scalp gently with the potion that danced on his skin, leaving shiny pink streaks where bloody, crushed wounds had been. Ron moaned, and a rush of memories so vivid pushed the grey walls of sky in near, forcing Hermione to bite her lip hard to keep from passing out as well.

Draco murmured his method, knowing that she needed his voice to calm her. "The potion was to help with pain. Best to get it in right away. Works better. This shoulder is more than I can do, after the Splinching. I want to get him to stop bleeding, though. Get it so we can move him to St. Mungo's so someone who knows what he's doing can look at him."

Ron blinked himself conscious and looked around groggily. Draco nodded grimly at him, and Hermione squeezed his hand. He smiled sickly at the man attending to his shoulder. "Thangs, Drago. You're great. Ow. 'Mione, Drago's m'friend. He said nice things 'bout Fred. You should marry Drago, 'Mione." Ron turned green, and Draco waved Hermione away in time to avoid Ron's vomit. "Owwww." Ron moaned.

"Shite. Shut _up_, Weasley. I can't give you more potion if you spew it up." Draco was still muttering over the wound, waving his wand, pointedly ignoring his girlfriend staring at the pair of them.

"You said _spew. _S'funny, see, "ermione?" Ron sighed with a shudder and pulled Draco's shirt so that their noses were almost touching. "Are we hugging? You smell nice for a Slytherin arsehole." He chuckled and then gasped in pain and turned grey.

Hermione shook off Ron's delirium-induced words and started blotting at his scratches with the dittany. "Can you just _Silencio_ him, Draco? He keeps moving around when he talks."

Draco continued to avoid looking at her as he gently peeled Ron's hands off him. He kept one wrist in his hand, his thumb on Ron's pulse. "I can't. If I do, we won't know if he's choking. I think we can move him soon. Thanks for that." Draco plucked the dittany bottle out of her hand. "Can you leave me with this idiot - who unfortunately will outlive us all? Maybe he will shut up if you do."

Neville brought the hellebore and crouched over Ron. Draco took it, and as Hermione stepped away, she could hear him apologize and add that he didn't think Ron could wait this out.

Hermione stood, hugging herself, watching Neville levitate Ron, Draco holding Ron under his armpits, Ron's head lolling back onto Draco's shoulder. Ron turned and apparated together with Draco, and Neville followed a moment after.

Hermione stared at the spot they had left, and numbly gathered potions left behind. Her wand was shaking as she Scourgified the blood from the ground.

Harry's irritated yell cut through the ringing in her ears. "_JASPER_!" Harry was storming back though the campgrounds, Anthony, Susan, and Meredith in his wake.

Jasper twitched having been summoned thus twice in short succession. Hermione thought suddenly that Meredith could probably do better.

Harry's swearing grew louder as he came nearer. Hermione thought of Snape, and how vicious he was when he thought Harry had willingly thrown himself in danger. Harry reminded her of her Potions professor at this exact moment.

"Point one! Do not bloody run off to snog in the bloody forest when we bloody told you to stay with us! Do you think every bloody camping party has Aurors who just want to bloody skip along to make bloody daisy chains and _sing_?" Harry roared at the student, just a year or two younger than himself, yet throughly cowed by the furious wizard before him. "Point two, you colossal arse! You don't drag your girlfriend out into the bloody woods and then get spooked and bloody ditch her! I hope she ditches you!"

Jasper mumbled, "Actually, Potter, she dragged me..."

Harry looked at Jasper wildly, sparks shooting out from his wand. He laughed suddenly, and rubbed his hand over his mouth and then through his hair. "Christ. Well, Meredith, you've snagged yourself a real keeper, here. I'd send you back to Professor McGonagall now, but I think I would rather you both carry our packs." Only Hermione knew that Harry hadn't come unhinged; the yelling was just yelling, and though he was the savior of the wizarding world, he was still quite nervous he'd bunged up one of his first Auror assignments. His anger was oddly grounding. "Where's Ron?" Harry asked. "Neville? Draco?"

Hermione stared hard at Jasper and Meredith and said with a voice of unnerving calm, "I'm sick of camping. I'm never going to do it again. Go throw yourselves at the service of Susan and Anthony and whoever else feels like giving you a job to do. And if you two so much as hug within my sight, I will put you in front of the portrait of Severus Snape when we get back, and I shall make you tell him in great detail what you two were up to in your absence. Is that clear?" They nodded, looking anywhere but at each other, grateful for the release from the furious Harry Potter. Susan followed them back to have her turn to pick at them uninterrupted.

She waited until they were both back with their groups and turned to Harry. "Ron's been hurt. Jasper apparated on top of him. He hit his head on a rock, but Draco is worried more about his shoulder. It's the one he splinched. Draco and Neville took him to St. Mungo's," Harry muttered more Jasper-laden profanity under his breath.

A silver otter slid through the clearing and stopped in front of Hermione. Draco's relieved voice rang out in the clearing. "He's in a bed, and the Healers are working on his shoulder. We did the right thing bringing him here; it's pretty ugly. But they think they can patch him up, and he's no more addled than before. Ow! Easy, Nev!" Hermione figured Neville was nearby, and she was relieved to hear the levity in his voice. She smiled as the otter soared off into nothingness.

She was so relieved she hadn't realized Harry was still next to her. "It is an otter, isn't it?"

She turned to look at Harry. His face was unreadable. "Yes, Harry. An otter."

"Right. Well. Okay, then." Harry nodded at her, with a small, weary smile of affection, and threw his arm around Anthony. "C'mon, mate. Let's go _camping_. It's so _fun_." Anthony chuckled, and Hermione heard a muttered promise of a firewhiskey when they returned.


	8. And the Greatest Magic of All

Draco had sent word through his silver otter that he would be returning shortly, so Hermione chose to wait up for him. She had smiled at the Patronus, happy to hear word about Ron, but she also suspected that Draco simply had wanted to use this messenger as much as possible, now that he knew how.

Harry decided the wards could stay down, and he tucked himself into his tent early, his suspect now safely held in custody.

Hermione wanted to stay awake for Draco, however, and Neville, Parvati and Seamus kept watch with her. The fire was mostly glowing chunks of orange ember when Draco apparated into the clearing.

He hugged Hermione and waved wearily as he plopped down on a stump circling the fire.

"Well, that was one way to spend a day," he said quietly. "Ron's going to be back to normal, for him, in a couple of days. Molly and Pip send their thanks, Hermione. I think Pip wants to get Ron better just so we can all have dinner."

Hermione grinned. "So you all got along okay?"

"Swimmingly." Draco slid off the log and used it as a head rest. "I had no idea Ron could deputize me a Junior Auror."

Parvati gasped. "He made you a junior Auror?"

Draco closed his eyes. "No one is that addled, Parvati. Except maybe you."

Parvati threw a marshmallow at him.

"Hey, is Jasper around?" His voice became animated, and he looked at the other fires, glowing low.

Seamus pointed to a fire a short distance away. It was bright enough that they could see Jasper with a small group of friends. Hermione noticed Meredith was not one of them.

"He just ate. We made him and Meredith wait to clean up after everyone else first." Seamus muttered.

"Ah. Excellent. I'd like a word." Draco stiffly stood up and slowly approached the group. Hermione was reminded of a cat approaching its prey before it paused to strike.

She could hear low voices, and she turned to wish Seamus and Parvati a good night when they froze at the sound of retching. They could see Jasper's dark form bent double and Draco jauntily strutting back to the campfire; his reenergized and satisfied smile illuminated as he drew closer.

"What the hell was that?" Seamus asked.

"Want to see the pictures I took of Ron's shoulder? It's an interesting injury. I'm going to write a paper for _Sorcery Surgery-"_

Hermione looked up, dryly. "You showed Jasper the pictures."

Draco nodded, his grin widening. "He didn't _want_ to see, but I insisted. He started looking a bit peaky when I showed him the adipose tissue in the subcutaneous layer, but I really wanted him to get a feel for Ron's evening, you know?"

Everyone stared at him.

He nodded. "Don't think he wants to be a Healer, Jasper."

Seamus snorted. "We should have hung out more in school, Draco, if only-"

"-I weren't a Death Eater. Yeah." Draco shrugged and pulled a face as he looked up at the stars slipping through clouds.

Seamus snorted an inappropriate laugh that burst louder as he he tried to bite it back. Draco looked at Hermione, and smiled a sad little smile. He grinned at Seamus, but Hermione could see that he wanted to laugh, but he couldn't make himself. He looked vaguely back at the inky sky.

Hermione's jumble of feelings surged, and she seized upon the first thought that clarified.

"Thank you, Draco."

He blinked at her, surprise hardening to a pained look. "There is no need to thank me. I think anyone would do the same. Anyone who didn't want to see Ron disabled."

He swallowed. Hermione looked at him carefully. Neville ignored him as he gently rearranged a log with a whispered spell.

Draco squared his shoulders. "I think I need sleep. This day didn't turn out like I had hoped at all. Hope it's okay if I turn in." He moved to turn away, then checked himself and stepped over to Hermione, placing a chaste peck on her cheek, and breathed a "love you" in her ear. He didn't look at her, and he walked quickly back to his tent.

Hermione looked stricken and confused. Neville stretched and crossed his legs, without looking up at her. "Last time he was at St. Mungo's, he was a criminal and a patient. He doesn't want to remember a time when he wanted Ron to suffer. He heard your thanks as a reminder that he could have done something else."

"How do you know? That isn't what I meant at all!" Hermione's voice rose in hurt.

"'Course it isn't. He's going to be broody, isn't he? Christ, I am, and I don't have regrets."

Parvati sagged. "This was the worst idea."

Hermione's heart was pounding. She rounded on her, feeling the need to discharge the swell of feelings overwhelming her.

"No. It was _good!_" she shouted, turning the heads of the few clutches of campers still awake.

Parvati stared at her.

"No, it was good because Harry and Ron caught Mrs. Yaxley. And Dean and I survived without too many horrible memories. And you have figured out that you don't want to let Seamus go."

Parvati looked up, startled by this, but in the dreadful moment when Hermione was wondering if she should apologize, Pavati, in a low voice looking softly at Seamus, said, "No. I don't."

Hermione breathed out a calming sigh of relief and looked away from Seamus, who was frozen in place, blinking furiously. She continued, her voice steady. "And Neville taught some brilliant lessons, and Draco got to show the other houses he is _trying_, and Justin and Anthony got to see each other for longer than a couple of hours. And Susan seems really happy being with her friend Hannah, which I can't remember seeing in a long while. I feel sick about Ron - he really has been through enough, but we took care of him, and he is going to be okay." Hermione whispered the last: "Everything was as horrible as it could get for so long, that this strange weekend seems weirdly okay. It's going to be okay. This is how love works. We are just all here for each other."

Neville stood when he saw the first tear spill down her cheek and folded her into a hug, her sobs muffled by his chest.

"Crap day, but you are right. You need sleep, too. Come on," Neville guided her to her tent as if she'd stumbled from a bad dream, and it made Hermione hiccup a sob as she let him put his arm around her.

..o0O0o..

Hermione smelled bacon and woodsmoke; she was the last in the tent, and she could hear chatter and the scraping of plates outside.

She blinked as her eyes adjusted to the sunshine outside, and she realized she had taken a lie-in; half the camp hand been packed away, and some groups had already taken down their tents.

Susan smiled at her and passed her a plate; in an instant, Hermione knew that her speech had made the rounds. She smiled wearily back and took the plate, looking for Draco. She found him packing up his fishing tackle, and she took her food and went to him.

"Good morning, Draco, I-"

Draco had seen her coming a moment earlier, just enough time to interrupt her. "I am sorry, Hermione. I know you were happy I was there to get Ron out, and I let my feelings overtake what you wanted to say. I know you meant well. You always do." He smiled at her sadly.

Hermione put her plate down and hugged him hard, whispering into his chest, "I love you."

He kissed the top of her head. "I love you, too. You need to know I am going to always do anything I can for you. Always. Like now. Please eat." His voice had a finality to it that made Hermione answer with a nod. He pulled away to keep packing, but Hermione could see he looked far more relaxed than before.

"Pip owled. Ron's looking well this morning," he offered.

"Oh, can I see the note?"

Draco busied himself with the gear. "That was pretty much it." He looked very uncomfortable.

"Draco Malfoy, you are a terrible liar."

"No, I am an excellent liar. I am terrible at lying to you." He sighed and handed over the parchment and attacked a knotted line with his wand.

Hermione looked at him curiously as she opened the note.

_Draco, _

_Ron feels so much better today. He was able to eat, which is a low benchmark for him, but it is loads better than when I first saw him. It scared me silly, when I got there. Thank you for being so calm with me and Molly (I get to call her Molly, she says. Poor Ron. He might never get his way again!) _

_I'm feeding you and Hermione when he's home and healed. More than biscuits, though I am glad you liked them! The recipe is on the back - can you give it to Hermione?_

_Ron just woke up. He says he wants me to tell you he's sorry he "cocked it up for him, and to just do it now, and he'll know why."_

_Does that make any sense? If not, owl back, and I will ask the Healers if they can lower his dosages._

_Pip x_

Hermione stared at the letter.

"Did it make any sense?" she asked, slowly, not knowing the meaning of the letter but wondering cautious thoughts.

Draco had put down the fishing gear and nodded as he walked over to her and led her to a log near the campfire. He was being very deliberate; it made Hermione feel fluttery for reasons she couldn't solidify.

"It makes sense to me." He looked at her with an intensity that made her softly gasp, and she didn't ask him why as he pulled her down next to him, holding her hands. He took a deep breath that shuddered a bit.

"Hermione, I love you. I know now that I will always love you. I want a whole life with you in it. If you say you aren't ready to decide, I will wait - I will ask again, but I know I want to marry you _now_. And I wanted to ask you if you would please marry me?"

He had slid down on the ground to kneel before her, so he could see her face as she looked at their hands.

Hermione looked at him. She was in shock and she wasn't; she knew her mind, yet she wanted to understand.

She said, carefully, "Why should you do it now? Why did Ron say that you would know what he meant?"

Draco blinked and smiled at her, which surprised her, for her rash question had an abruptness she didn't mean. "I knew I would get interrogated," he smirked. "Well, I didn't ask Ron's _permission_ to marry you, but I told him I was going to ask you. That I want to be with you, that I love you, and I wasn't going to stop. I needed to know that he would be your friend no matter what you said. Even if you were, maybe, to say yes. The _do it now_ was his answer. He said that if you love someone, you should always tell them. Because people need to know." He looked at her searchingly.

Hermione thought of the Yule Ball. She thought of Fred. Of Percy, the one they almost lost. She nodded.

"Emotional range of a teaspoon," she murmured.

"What?" Draco frowned.

"Nothing," she grinned. She surprised herself. No tears. She thought she would have cried. Draco was gazing at her face, nervously.

"Draco, we are terribly young. I thought it was odd that Harry and Ron's parents married so young - that it was a weird Wizarding tradition. But I see now, it's just that they lived their lives quickly. They saw too much. It made a lot of things simple that seem complicated to everyone else."

Draco had stopped breathing. She put her lips to his and breathed a _yes_, and he inhaled it and slid onto the log bench and kissed her, and she could feel every bit of longing and love and promise he had ever shown her. The kiss was not sweet or tender; it was urgent and dizzying - Hermione felt for the first time the power to Draco's controlled manner that he had held back, his kisses taking her - _Hermione, you are mine_. And she kissed him back, her mouth offering up her soul to him in return - _yes, yes, Draco, you belong to me. _

They were both breathless when they finally pulled apart.

He leaned his forehead down to hers and fished in his shirt pocket, and pulled out a gold band with a row of glittering diamonds. He lifted his eyebrows in question, and when Hermione gave a dazed, tiny nod, he slid it on her finger, holding there with his own, as though he needed to be sure of it, in case it were all in his mind.

She leaned up and kissed him, and this kiss was gentle, and slow, though Hermione noticed it was, even more than the last, warming her thoroughly. Her thoughts slid to the evening she had planned in her mind, and how she was going to be sharing it with her husband-to-be. Flashes of her imagined evening pounded in her chest, sending shivers through her.

Draco absently rubbed her arms, thinking she felt chilled.

"Hermione Granger is going to marry me," Draco murmured, as he kissed her again. "I want to tell everyone. Now."

Hermione beamed, not wanting to tear her eyes away from his, but the warm band on her ring finger was demanding attention.

Draco grinned and nodded. "It fits! My mother guessed."

"It's beautiful, gold…"

"You really didn't think I would give you a Slytherin House ring, did you?" He smirked. "No, it's three generations' worth of Malfoy and Black diamonds, right there. All honestly come by, for the record. I had it made into a new ring for you. Went to a Muggle jeweler - Garrard. Seemed like they wouldn't nick the stones." Hermione stared at him wondering if he was being facetious, but he didn't seem to notice. "Goblins don't like it when you ask them to mess with their work." Hermione wasn't used to hearing Draco brag about his possessions, for he knew they were of little concern to her, but she did thrill at the pride in his voice, and the ring was stunning.

"Thank you for giving it to me."

"Thank you for wearing it."

They kissed again; it was a quick kiss, as they were both having a hard time not smiling.

Hermione thought for a moment. "Over Christmas, all those hours of talking, we shared everything we wanted, sort of dancing around the idea that we might want them together."

"The Ministry, St. Mungo's, children probably someday, a place in London?"

"Right. But now that this is real, there is one thing we didn't share."

Draco looked apprehensive. He bit his lip and waited.

"I want to keep my name."

Draco exhaled a laugh. "Merlin. You scared me. Of course, Ms. Granger. I love you, just the way you are, in all your Grangeriness. Will you be upset if I don't take your name? I have a lot of work to do to polish up the House of Malfoy, starting with our family crest, but I've gotten used to it."

"Draco Granger sounds mad." Hermione nodded solemnly.

"An action hero."

"We'll just combine our names."

"Not hyphens." Draco rolled his eyes.

"No. _Danger_," she giggled.

"Has a ring of blunt honesty to it." He pulled a face. "Can I tell people now?"

"Tell people? Well, yes, but what-"

Draco jumped on the log and pressed his wand to his throat. "HERMIONE GRANGER IS GOING TO MARRY ME!"

She gasped. "Draco!"

"AND SHE IS NEITHER POISONED NOR IMPERIOUSED!"

Hermione blushed furiously and tugged at his jacket; her rush to stop him was impeded by not really wanting to stop him at all. He was flushed and happy and _beautiful_. She laughed instead and waved when Dean wolf whistled and blushed harder when Anthony yelled, "Kiss her, you lucky bastard!" Draco grinned down at her, and before she could think to stand, he lifted her off her feet, and dipped her dramatically, and kissed her again.

Harry, her first friend, was the first to come to her. He gave her a hug and whispered, "I love you. Congratulations."

"It's exactly what I want. Thank you."

Harry's eyes ranged over her. "We aren't going to lose you, are we?"

Hermione hugged him, smiling over his shoulder at Dean and Seamus who were thumping Draco hard on the back. "I am going to be at the Ministry, somewhere. I am going to be seeing you more than I do now. And we won't be scared, like we were for so long. I'm keeping my name…and I am so loved. I'm in love. I will be more _me _than I have felt in a while, to be honest."

"He is a different man."

"We all are different, yes."

Harry looked at her, the look so searching that she half-expected a push of Legilimency.

"War changes everything, Harry. But it will never change how I feel about you. And neither will anyone else."

Hermione listened to what she said, and she knew in that moment it what was Harry needed. He was scared of losing any more of his family he'd had to build for himself.

"I'd better go congratulate your fiancé."

He walked her to Parvati and Hannah and pulled Draco away.

Hermione, who never cared for flaunting things, found she rather liked showing off the ring. She decided not to feel conflicted about it.

The group eventually had their say about it, and Hermione called to the students to start packing up to hike back to the castle.

Draco appeared again before her with all his gear packed, and he gave her a shy smile as he quietly began packing up her cooking kit.

"Harry?" she asked.

Draco smiled. "I've said it before - you have a lot of brothers for being an only child."

Hermione pulled a sheepish face. "What did he say?"

Draco nodded. "I'm not sure he wants me to tell, so I won't. But I can say that I promised to do whatever it takes to make you happy, for the rest of my life."

_Oh. There are the tears, _Hermione thought, as she rushed Draco and hugged him hard. "You already have, Draco, and I can't wait."

**A/N: That is it for this one, everyone. I sure do appreciate each of your favorites and follows and reviews. Hope you liked this story, and thank you for reading it. xx Cords**


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